Home tattoo kits 'are putting teenagers at risk from disease'

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Home tattoo kits 'are putting teenagers at risk from disease'

By Hickman, Consumer Affairs Correspondent

Teenagers are putting themselves at risk of debilitating and potentially deadly

blood diseases by buying DIY tattoo kits over the internet. At £60 a time, the

kits come with inks, needles and designs but there are no controls over age of

the recipient, infectious diseases, or cleanliness. Children have caught

hepatitis from such kits, which are cheaper than visiting a professional,

particularly if used several times.

The Chartered Institute of Environmental Health (CIEH) sounded the alarm after

carrying out an investigation into tattooing trends and practise. Professional

parlours are legally required not to tattoo anyone under 18 and are licensed and

inspected by local authorities. By contrast, Chinese-made kits often have no

instructions.

Barratt, the CIEH director, said: " The age of consent goes out the window.

You are not going to ask questions about health. You could be tattooing your

mates all in one go and passing on infections. You also cannot trace people if

anything goes wrong. You wouldn't do this with anything else – you can't stroll

into Boots and buy a needle. "

Unsafe tattooing – without health screening and cleanliness – risks spreading

HIV/Aids and hepatitis. In Llanelli, south Wales, in 2008, teenagers as young as

14 using DIY kits found that their tattoos becoming infected and Several

contracted hepatitis.

In a study to be published on Thursday, the CIEH's Wales researcher,

, found that more than half of professional tattooists broke rules on best

practise. Students visited parlours posing as potential customers and asked by

telephone whether tattooists would work at an all-weekend 30th birthday party.

Of the 33 parlours visited, only 61 per cent screened for medical conditions and

only 52 per cent offered any advice. Only 7 per cent asked for proof that the

client was an adult. Of 56 licensed parlours asked whether they would attend the

party, 49 rejected the idea. However, seven accepted despite the likelihood of

the clients' decisions being influenced by alcohol or peer pressure. Conditions

might have been unclean or unsafe for other reasons. The research, carried out

in Cardiff, Caerphilly, Newport, Bridgend, Monmouthshire, Rhondda-Cynon Taf,

Torfaen and the Vale of Glamorgan, will be presented to a CIEH conference on

Thursday.

Describing some of the findings as " astonishing " , Ms Barratt said tattoos should

be regulated more closely because they were occasional purchases as well as

being permanent. " It's not like having your fringe cut – it's not going to grow

back, " she said.

Gore, the Chief Executive of The Hepatitis C Trust, said: “The rise in

DIY tattooing is particularly alarming when you consider viruses such as

hepatitis C. Most people don't realise that transmission's not just about

needles: sharing any equipment, including things like ink pots, is a risk. Often

hepatitis C has no symptoms for decades so anyone who has had a tattoo that

might not have been safe, at home or on holiday, should think about getting

tested. Like everything, hepatitis C is a lot easier to treat if it's caught

early.”