Tattoo inks and microbial contamination

This week's article looks at microbial contamination risks associated with tattoo inks and the tattoo process and assesses recently published US FDA guidance: 

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/tattoos-microbial-infection-risks-tim-sandle-ph-d-cbiol-fisct-eqiue/

Save 50.0% on select products from Colourbing with promo code 50LQ68OG, through 1/5 while supplies last. 

Many tattoo inks are contaminated, although different rounds of laboratory analysis show a degree of variation according to locale and ink source. However, there has been a commonality over the past decade for ~50% of inks found to contain microorganisms (10–80% of unopened commercial tattoo inks are contaminated with microorganisms according to my review of the literature. The populations recovered are up to 3·6 × 10^8 CFU per gram. It should be noted that studies tend to pinpoint higher rates of contamination in North America compared with Europe.

Posted by Dr. Tim Sandle, Pharmaceutical Microbiology Resources (http://www.pharmamicroresources.com/)