Although this information sounds accurate, it fails to ask WHERE the people that have tattoos and HCV got their tattoos from.
It's easy to say that people with tattoos are 4x more likely to have contracted the HCV virus, but these findings are unclear about how many of these people got their tattoos from unlicensed "artists" working out of their homes, as opposed to getting them from a legitimate shop, where the work is regulated by the local Board of Health.
As the popularity of tattooing increases, so does the popularity of the "home artist" (or 'scratcher', as they are known in the tattooing industry). These scratchers generally use unsafe practices and are more likely to pass on viruses to their clients than a legitimate tattooer.
I came across this article from Google News' RSS with the search parameter set to 'tattooing'. Here is a link: news.google.com/.../search
I'm willing to bet that if you were to use that link, there'd be more than 4 news articles within the first 10 that report about illegal tattooing. It's becoming a real problem, not only for real tattooers, but for the health of the general public.
It's articles like these that perpetuate the mentality of uninformed (or misinformed)  individuals that getting a tattoo poses unnecessary risk. The fact being that your chances of contracting ANY virus from a legitimate tattooer working at a regulated tattoo shop are slim to none. In fact, as of this writing, there have been NO reported cases of ANYONE, EVER contracting HIV or AIDS from a tattoo shop, and only a few reported cases of anyone contracting HCV (or Hepatitis C).
I sure would be interested in where the participants in this study with tattoos and HCV received their tattoos from. Most certainly not from a tattoo shop.