The Torah states in Leviticus 19:28 that permanent tattooing on the body violates Jewish law: “You shall not make cuts in your flesh for the dead, nor cut any mark on yourselves: I am the LORD. » Furthermore, the Rambam (Maimonides) saw the origin of this ban as an act of idolatry, arguing that it was a pagan custom.
Perhaps the great Jewish Torah commentator knew something that Swedish scientists now suspect. They have just published a study on the subject in the journal E-Clinical Medicine under the title “Tattoos as a risk factor for malignant lymphoma: a population-based case-control study”.
Christel Nielsen, Mats Jerkeman and Anna Saxne Jöud from Lund University wrote that the popularity of tattoos has increased significantly in recent decades. Tattoo ink often contains cancer-causing chemicals, including primary aromatic amines, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and metals.
Understudied area
Several European studies have reported a prevalence of tattoos greater than 20%, and the American prevalence is estimated at 30%.
“Most people get their first tattoo at a young age, which means exposure to certain chemical constituents of tattoo ink for most of their lives. Yet research only scratches the surface of understanding the long-term health effects of tattoos,” the Lund University researchers wrote in the essay.
“Our knowledge regarding the long-term health effects of tattoos is poor and there is not much research in this area.
“To our knowledge, this is the first epidemiological study to investigate the association between tattoo exposure and overall malignant lymphoma as well as lymphoma subtypes, using a case-control design based on population and a large sample size,” they continued.
“A tattoo, regardless of its size, triggers mild inflammation in the body, which in turn can trigger cancer. The picture is therefore more complex than we initially thought,” the team said.
“The tattooing process triggers an immunological response that causes the tattoo ink to translocate from the injection site. Deposition of tattoo pigments in lymph nodes has been confirmed, but its long-term health effects remain unexplored. We used the Swedish National Authority registries covering the entire population to study the association between exposure to tattoos and overall malignant lymphoma as well as lymphoma subtypes,” explained the researchers. .
They performed a case-control study in which they identified all cases of malignant lymphoma diagnosed between 2007 and 2017 in people aged 20 to 60 years old. Additionally, three random age- and sex-matched controls per case were sampled from the total population.
The risk associated with exposure to tattoos appeared to be highest for diffuse large B-cell lymphoma and follicular lymphoma. “Our results suggest that exposure to tattoos was associated with an increased risk of malignant lymphoma, but additional epidemiological research is urgently needed to establish causality,” they wrote.
“We already know that when tattoo ink is injected into the skin, the body interprets it as something foreign that should not be there and the immune system is activated. Much of the ink is carried from the skin to the lymph nodes, where it is deposited,” Nielsen said.
The research group will now carry out studies to determine whether there is also a link between tattoos and other types of cancer. They also want to further research other inflammatory diseases to see if there is a link to tattoos in these cases.
“If people want to continue to express their identity through tattoos, it is very important that we as a society can ensure their safety. For the individual, it is good to know that tattoos can affect your health and that you should turn to your doctor if you experience symptoms that you think may be related to your tattoo,” they concluded. .
News Source : www.jpost.com
Gn Health
