Body art is art work done on the body of man. It might be for the purpose of beautification, identification or medication.

1. EFFECT OF BODY ART ON
ENVIRONMENT AND HEALTH
Adedotun T. ADEOLU
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2. Outline
- Introduction
- What is Body art?
- Types of Body arts
- Components of tattoo ink
- Reactions in tattoo ink
- Health effects of tattoo
- Environmental effects of tattoo
- Conclusion
- Recommendation
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3. Introduction
Body art is art work done on the body of
man. It might be for the purpose of
beautification, identification or medication.
‘The key to man’s health lies largely in his
environment.
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4. Introduction cont’d
Much of man’s ill health can be traced to
adverse social environmental factors such as
habits and practices that might be influenced
by custom, culture and socio-economic
factors.
The practice of body arts (especially tattooing
and piercing), once not very common in
developing countries, has now expanded into
societies. Mostly young people have shown
great enthusiasm for these practices.
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5. Introduction cont’d
Little or no consideration is given to the
health implications as most of the
materials and conditions with which and
under which they are carried out are
detrimental to man’s health.
Under unsanitary conditions, a lot of health
problem do arise from these practices.
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6. Types of Body Art
• Tattoos
• Body piercing
• Branding
• Scarification
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7. Body Piercing
• Piercing involves long-term insertion of an
object through the skin allowing
ornaments to be worn.
• Body piercing is prevalent in our society.
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8. Any penetration
of the skin with
resultant
bleeding has the
potential to
cause infections
including the
transmission of
blood borne
viruses such as
HIV and Hepatitis
B or C
Source: Southern Primary Health – Noarlunga, October 2006
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9. Scarification
Scarification involves scratching, etching,
burning/branding or superficially cutting
designs, pictures or words into the body
as a permanent body modification.
Variables, such as skin type, cut depth and
how the wound is treated while healing,
makes the outcome unpredictable.
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10. There are
numerous
infections
that can be
spread
through poor
hygiene
practices ,
e.g. HIV, HBV
Source: Crockodile Scarification. Korogo
village, 1975.
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11. West african scarification
Source:http://www.randomafricanart.co
m/Scarification_and_Cicatrisation_amo
ng_African_cultures.html
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12. Scarification
This is related to the communities where
traditionalists make the mark using the
primitive tools without proper sterilization
and treatment.
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13. Tattooing
Tattoo is the insertion of ink or some other
pigment through the outer covering of the
body (the epidermis) into the dermis, the
second layer of skin.
Due to high demand, the number of
unprofessional tattooists and piercers has
increased creating more complications due to
frequent procedures carried out without any
knowledge of health and hygiene rules .
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14. Tattoo
Source:http://www.lastsparrow.com/gall
ery/letting-tattoos/9699-no-regrets.html 14Adedotun T. ADEOLU

15. Arm Laser tattos
Source:
http://gasolemc.blogspot/2011/09/sweet-
tribal-art-man.html?m=1 15Adedotun T. ADEOLU

16. Henna tattoo
Source:http://iohu.org/rathayatra/festiva
l-of-india-harrisburg/henna-tattoo/ 16Adedotun T. ADEOLU

17. Componets of tattoo ink
• Inks may be made from iron oxides, metal salts and
plastics.
• Traditional tattoo inks may be made from pen ink,
soot, dirt, blood, or other ingredients.
• Heavy metals used for colours include mercury (red);
lead (yellow, green, white); cadmium (red, orange,
yellow); nickel (black); zinc (yellow, white); chromium
(green); cobalt (blue); copper (blue, green); iron
(brown, red, black); and barium (white).
• Carbon (soot or ash) is also used for black inks
• Organic chemicals used include azo-chemicals
(orange, brown, yellow, green, violet). 17Adedotun T. ADEOLU

18. Tattooists
use a sharp
implement to
puncture the
skin and
thus make
an indelible
mark,
design, or
picture on
the body.
Rotation-Tatoo Machine
Source: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tattoo
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19. A variety of inks used by tattooists.
Source: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tattoo
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20. Reactions in ink
• Releases of Aromatic Amines (o-anisidine, o-
toluidine) have been created by irradiation with UV
light. Aromatic amines are a class of chemicals
often found in plastics, pesticides, foams, dyes,
pharmaceuticals and semi-conductors.
• These amines have been linked to bladder and
breast cancer.
• The production of carcinogenic aromatic amines
and other substances if in certain inks/pigments
are irradiated by laser light in order to remove
tattoos.
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21. Glow in the dark ink and black light ink
Both black light and glow in the dark inks
have been used for tattooing. Glow in
the dark ink absorbs and retains light,
and then glows in darkened conditions
by process of phosphorescence.
Black light ink does not glow in the dark,
but reacts to non-visible UV light,
producing a visible glow by
fluorescence. The resulting glow of both
these inks is highly variable.
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22. Health effects of tattoos
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23. Source: Byron et al., 20012. Outbreak of Mycobacterium chelonae Infection
Associated with Tattoo Ink
Tattoo ink infection case study
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24. Toxicity and Photo-toxicity
• Many tattoo ink pigments photo-decompose in the
presence of sunlight to form cytotoxic and potentially
genotoxic products (Cuyper and Perez-Cotapos,
2010).
• Some of these decomposition products are suspect,
or known, human carcinogens.
• The skin possesses metabolic systems that can
metabolize ink pigments to multiple products.
• Using isolated enzyme systems, Pigment Yellow 74
is metabolized by cytochromes P450 to oxidized
products and is reduced at the nitro group to reactive
aryl nitroso and hydroxylamines.
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25. Allergies
• Most of the materials used are mainly azo dyes,
with specific reactions to mercury salt, nickel
sulphate and cadmium sulphide (Cuyper and
Perez-Cotapos, 2010).
• Reactions from sunlight and laser induced
chemical change in tattoo pigments.
• Reactions of tattoos supposed to be allergic in
nature really dominate the clinical spectrum of
chronic adverse events in tattoos.
• Reactions are inflammatory or so called “lichenoid”
and ranges from ulceration to excessive epidermal
hyperplasia.
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26. Lichenoid
reaction to
red ink in a
black and
red tattoo.
Ink allergy
Source: Cutaneous allergic reactions to tattoo
ink. Kaur et al., 2009.
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27. Reaction to
blue ink
with a
palpable
plaque and
localized
edema.
Ink allergy
Source: Cutaneous allergic reactions to
tattoo ink. Kaur et al., 2009.
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28. Microbial infections
• Poor hygienic standards and careless
procedures can result in localized infections and
also lead to severe life-threatening conditions or
even result in irreversible damage and scarring.
• The most frequent are local bacterial infections
at the site of the procedure.
• They are often caused by common pathogens
such as Streptococcus pyogenes and
Staphylococcus aureus, Mycobacterium
tuberculosis (TB), M. chelonae, M. leprae
(Leprosy)
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29. Microbial infections cont’d
• These infections can result in secondary
infections like cellulitis, sepsis, abscess,
endocarditis, and gangrene’
• Viral infections such as hepatitis A, B, C and D,
HIV and Herpes simplex.
• Systematic fungal infections like candidiasis
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30. Environmental Effects of Tattos
• Tattoo inks are made of substances like heavy
metals which has the potential to bio accumulate
in biological and environmental systems and
aromatic amines that could be carcinogenic.
• Due to improper management of this special
waste (hazardous), It gets mixed with solid
waste.
• During the rainy season, it may get added to the
ground water and spreads hazardous diseases.
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31. Conclusion
• Most tattoos are applied impulsively and ignorantly in
youths. They are often regretted and create significant
psychological, social and even financial burdens.
• Social environmental factors such as habit and practice
have a link to man’s state of health.
• Infections, allergies and scaring are part of health effects of
body arts.
• Tattoo inks are made of substances like heavy metals which
has the potential to bio accumulate in biological and
environmental systems and aromatic amines that could be
carcinogenic.
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32. Recommendations
• Tattoo dyes should be subject to testing or
licensing by national health authorities.
• Tattoo artists should avoid contamination and
consumers should be aware of the risks
associated with getting a tattoo.
• Health education should be directed against
socio-cultural practices which are aetiological
risk factors
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33. BODY ARTS
...think before you ink
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