New removal cream helps you eradicate unwanted tattoos

Up until now the only way to get rid of those unfortunate tattoos you got as a teenager was laser removal surgery. Alex Falkenham, a 27–year–old PhD student from Canada, may have a better solution. He’s been working on a tattoo removal cream to help rid the world of all those lower back butterflies and barbed wire tats that seemed like such a good idea at the time.

What’s the catch? According to Falkenham, there isn’t one. "When comparing it to laser-based tattoo removal, in which you see the burns, the scarring, the blisters, in this case, we've designed a drug that doesn't really have much off-target effect," he told CBC.

The cream utilises a method called bisphosphonate liposomal tattoo removal. For those of us without a PhD in Dermatology, that means the painless procedure will create new skin cells that destroy, and replace the old ink-filled ones.

While laser surgery can start upwards of £30 per session, the cream has a predicted cost of $4.50. That means even Illma Gore, the girl who launched an art project to tattoo your name on her body for $10, could start making a profit. Don’t get too excited though, the cream is still in testing – though we're sure there’s a whole lot of inked-up people out there who would be happy to play guinea pig.

UPDATE: Cyberpunk prophet and Neuromancer author William Gibson has weighed in on the cream, asking if tattoos even count as tattoos if they can be easily wiped off. What do you think?

If that tattoo-removed cream works, and is that cheap, and harmless, it's a game-changer.
— William Gibson (@GreatDismal) February 17, 2015

If tattoos can be cheaply, easily, painlessly removed, are they still tattoos? Cultural meanings shift with relative permanence?
— William Gibson (@GreatDismal) February 17, 2015