Anecdotally, we know about one in every 20 tattoos is regretted; we’ve got friends who, so sick of their once-cool Chinese symbol or small-of-back fairy, have had it covered up with something else. We also know that Cheryl Cole has got an entire arse like a gran’s sofa after she covered up her mid-2000s tribal stamp (and a lot more) with a red floral design.
But what we didn’t know – until this weekend – was that some people are getting their tattoo removals done on the NHS and the cost has been a whopping £330,000.
While the Government tightens the NHS’s purse-strings, using austerity to combat the financial deficit, people with stupid, regrettable tattoos have been getting them lasered off gratis!
Now, tattoo removal isn’t officially allowed on the NHS, but it can be done ‘to protect a person’s health’, especially when the inking in question causes the bearer ‘significant distress or serious mental health problems’.
Which, we guess, is fair enough.
Oh, and it also includes if the tattoo has caused a ‘significant allergic reaction or infection’, or if someone was tattooed against their will. Which are, again, pretty important reasons to provide a free service.
The Sun found in a Freedom of Information request that 2,016 people have taken it up since 2010, and are using it to suggest that perhaps this shouldn’t be on the NHS’s bill.
When you factor in reports which say four in ten people regretting their tattoos, we wonder if there should be a few more restrictions on people potentially abusing the laser-removal service, or maybe even a few more obstacles to getting dodgy ink done in the first place?
One tattoo-removal patient was John, 22, who wanted to get rid of the swastikas on his body so he could work out with his top off, he told the BBC, reports MailOnline: ‘You can’t really do that with something that is going to offend everybody... I want to move on in life. If I got them removed I’d be able to change my image.’
Yes, but if you’re stupid enough to brand yourself with a swastika, you should probably serve a little more punishment than the pain of a tattoo removal laser.
Andrew Gwynne, the shadow health minister, wasn’t impressed with the figures, saying, ‘People will struggle to see how this sheer waste of precious NHS money can be justified when hospitals do not have enough staff. Patient care is already heading downhill and more nurses could be lost under Tory spending cuts.’
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.