{"id":18131,"date":"2019-10-04T02:02:00","date_gmt":"2019-10-04T02:02:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=18131"},"modified":"2019-10-05T09:24:26","modified_gmt":"2019-10-05T09:24:26","slug":"untangling-tattoos-influence-on-immune-response","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/untangling-tattoos-influence-on-immune-response\/","title":{"rendered":"Untangling tattoos’ influence on immune response"},"content":{"rendered":"

Christopher D. Lynn<\/a>, University of Alabama<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

I lay on the mat of the open-air bungalow in Apia, Samoa, looking up at a gecko. As its tail quivered, I felt a sympathetic twitch in my leg. Su\u2019a Sulu\u2019ape Paulo III, the sixth-generation Samoan hand-tap tattoo master leaning over me, paused to see if my movement was due to pain.<\/p>\n

I\u2019d been in Samoa for a month, studying Samoan tattooing culture and the impact of the big traditional pieces called pe\u2019a and malu \u2013 tatau in general \u2013 on the immune system. Now I was getting my own hand-tapped leg tattoo, albeit considerably smaller.<\/p>\n

This field season was the fourth of my research on the relationship between tattooing and immune response. My first study had focused on a small sample, mostly women, in Alabama. What I\u2019d observed among that group suggested<\/a> that tattooing could help beef up one\u2019s immune response<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But one small study<\/a> in the United States wasn\u2019t proof of anything \u2013 despite headlines blaring that tattoos could cure the common cold. Good science means finding the same results multiple times and then interpreting them to understand something about the world.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why I traveled in 2018 with fellow anthropologist<\/a> Michaela Howells<\/a> to the Samoan Islands. Samoans have a long, continuous history of extensive tattooing. Working with contemporary machine and hand-tap tattooists in American Samoa, we wanted to see if we\u2019d find the same link to enhanced immune response.<\/p>\n