People visiting Benidorm have been issued a stark warning over getting tattoos in the Spanish holiday hotspot.
It’s not uncommon for people to return from a holiday with some new ink, especially when they visit a popular party resort such as Benidorm where alcohol may have some influence on their decisions.
However, it turns out not all of Benidorm’s tattoo shops are as safe as you might hope. Local YouTuber ‘Benidorm by Ana’, who has amassed more than 17,000 subscribers and regularly shares news from the town, recently uploaded a video in which she addressed this issue.
Ana said: “You have to find a very good place, a very good business, where you will actually let these people stick needles with paint inside of your body. And you might think, ‘These establishments are open, these establishments have to meet regulations, right? They should have their paperwork in order, they should have their licences, these artists should be trained’.
“A lot of the time, when you get inside, you see these typical printouts of pictures of tattoos. But you don’t know if it’s that person who performed this specific tattoo.”
Ana also pointed to what happened last weekend, with local police raiding two tattoo parlours and seizing more than 200 pieces of equipment. Police said in an update on Facebook: “More than 200 tattooing tools had to be confiscated in two establishments for not meeting sanitary conditions (inks, needles, lotions, etc.). Moreover, the tattooists were not authorised to exercise their activity.”
Ana went on: “These are needles! This should be sterile because it’s needles and you are putting something below your skin. And the skin gets scratched, and you might get an infection, there’s a lot of things that can go wrong, so you need to go to a place that you trust.” She still insisted there are some “great” tattoo studios in Benidorm and recommended Di Angelo Tattoo to her followers, which her husband has used in the past.
Ana concluded: “Whenever you see tattoo places that charge you really cheap, check out the surroundings, check if it’s clean, check how the utensils are being stored – don’t jump into it!”