"Your Tattoo Might Have Printer Ink or Car Paint in It"

"Emily Pratt wasn’t impressed when she heard about the U.S. Food and Drug Administration probe into the potentially deleterious effects of tattoo ink. She would have shrugged to show how little she cared, but she was a bit sore from the tattoo machine that had just been smacking away at her left forearm.

This was her seventh inking, after all: a wrap-around bouquet of six roses in shades of yellow and red rendered at Embassy Tattoos in Washington. “The fact that I’m here,” the 22-year-old said, recovering in the waiting room near a stuffed mongoose, “says I’m not worried about the side effects.”

But the FDA is, as are some experts in the field. The concern has grown with the explosion in the body art’s popularity and the availability of tools and inks online. The industry is growing about 9 percent a year, a rate research company IBISWorld projects will make it a $1.1 billion business by 2020.

“Even the most reputable places can’t guarantee the safety of ink,” said Arisa Ortiz, a dermatologist and assistant professor at the University of California, San Diego, and co-author of a 2011 article that cited reports by researchers in Spain, Germany and the U.S. who discovered substances including mercury and charcoal in tattoo dyes."

Bradley Joseph Saacks reports for Bloomberg August 30, 2016.