3 ms·
The amount of ink that goes into the skin is tiny - maybe a gram of ink for a normal size tattoo. So when they get upset about ethanol or even propylene glycol
by bcatanzaro 3y ago
The amount of ink that goes into the skin is tiny - maybe a gram of ink for a normal size tattoo. So when they get upset about ethanol or even propylene glycol - I wouldn't think the amounts are large enough to be very significant. When it comes to dyes though - I would be afraid of some of those bright colors, I have no idea what they are using and a lot of dyes are toxic. My tattoos are all black and gray - even though carbon black also contains carcinogens, I think the history of humans using it for tattoos for thousands of years shows that carbon black tattoos are not likely to cause cancer.
- throwaway17_17 3y agoJust out of curiosity, what is your assumed size for a 'normal' sized tattoo?
- ipqk 3y agoJust because it's been done for thousands of years doesn't mean it doesn't cause cancer. No one's going to be able to relate cancer to a tattoo made a dozen years beforehand, and even now when we have the ability to study it, it doesn't look like anyone really is.
- bcatanzaro 3y agoGenerally that might be true, but I think if carbon black ink caused cancer with any nontrivial probability, the cancer would be likely to start where the tattoo is placed, and people would quickly decide that tattoos were dangerous because they would see the tattoo melting into a cancerous lesion. I’ve literally never heard of skin cancer that come from a tattoo. Tattoos are so common that we would see this effect if it happened.