Blog post #5: Tattoos Can Give Cancer

As much as people like to be tattooed, do they really know the side effects and diseases that they might encounter? Usually, people get excited about tattoos and just want to show them off without even bothering to know the chemicals being used in to them.

In relation to the topic, I found an article entitled "Could your tattoo give you cancer? Scientists fear toxins from ink could enter blood and accumulate in your major organs" by the Daily Mail Reporter from the site www.dailymail.co.uk.

Scientists revealed that toxins from tattoo ink could be absorbed into the body and cause cancer. Experts believe that nanoparticles coming from the ink could enter the blood system, the spleen and the kidneys which can be can harmful because the body looses the ability to filter impurities. There where also studies that have found carcinogens in some ink and dyes in the UK and scientists want more regulation of the dyes used by the industry. In addition to that, Public Health England says that some inks contain substances such as cobalt and mercury.

Scientists want to do some regulations and control checks on tattoo dyes that have already been introduced on the smoking and sunbathing industries. Desmond Tobin, director of Bradford University's Centre for Skin Sciences, was shocked to discover there was no regulation on inks.

"Some inks are sold with little or no accompanying product data, and their composition may remain uncertain even at the point of use," said the Public Health England.

People should be more aware when they get their tattoos, make sure to ask the tattoo artist the ink that they use and if they have a license to make sure that they are really a tattoo artist and make sure to chose a clean tattoo studio, so that you may avoid having disease.

In addition to this topic, I came across this article entitled "To dye for? Jury still out on tattoo ink causing cancer" by Ian Oliver from the site www.theconversation.com

Last year, Jorgen Serup, Professor of Dermatology from Copenhagen University, reported that 13 of 21 tattoo inks commonly used in Europe contained cancer-causing chemicals. Even tattoo ink manufacturers admit that 5 percent of their products contain these types of chemicals.

But even if these inks do contain components that can potentially lead to cancer, we still don't know whether they will actually cause it to the people exposed to them. Maybe it is only risky to those who have large doses of ink used on their skin. Perhaps only small doses are required for it to happen.

Further evidence could easily be collected by observing if people with tattoos have more cancers than those without. The problem here is that the process of getting cancer often takes a long time, so there must be allowed a sufficient time between the tattoo and the recording of cancer.

"Unless the association between cancer and tattoos is very strong, it may be difficult to tease out the tattoo as the cause of the cancer," says Ian Oliver.

There are a lot of factors that can cause cancer. It's not just tattoo. But there should be more strict regulations for inks because, every year, more and more people are getting them. There should be more research done about this topic and they should announce it more to the people. For me, every action has its own risk. So you should just ask yourself if you are willing to take this risk for a piece of art in your body.