By Jason Gale | Bloomberg

Tattoo ink doesn’t just sit inertly in the skin. New research shows it moves rapidly into the lymphatic system, where it can persist for months, kill immune cells, and even disrupt how the body responds to vaccines.

Scientists in Switzerland used a mouse model to trace what happens after tattooing. Pigments drained into nearby lymph nodes within minutes and continued to accumulate for two months, triggering immune-cell death and sustained inflammation.

The ink also weakened the antibody response to Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE’s Covid vaccine when the shot was administered in tattooed skin. In contrast, the same inflammation appeared to boost responses to an inactivated flu vaccine.

The findings, published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy o

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