Kampala: Global health charity Marie Stopes said Wednesday it had recalled hundreds of thousands of faulty condoms on sale in Uganda, where HIV rates are among the highest in the world.
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The recall followed a warning from Uganda’s National Drug Authority (NDA) that the Life Guard brand condoms had failed manufacturing “quality tests” because they contained holes and may burst.
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The affected condoms were manufactured by India-based MHL Healthcare in April 2019 and have an expiry date of April 2024, the government regulator said.
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Marie Stopes Uganda spokesman David Kamu told AFP on Wednesday that the two affected batches each contained “around 400,000” condoms.
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Earlier reports had suggested millions of condoms could have been involved but NDA spokesman Fred Ssekyana told AFP the figure was below one million.
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Marie Stopes Uganda said more than half of the condoms of concern had been recalled.
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“While the LifeGuard brand follows strict quality controls, unfortunately two recent batches have fallen short of the quality we demand,” the charity’s country director, Carole Sekimpi, said in a statement Tuesday.
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Marie Stopes is the largest and most specialised sexual reproductive health organisation in Uganda, the charity says on its website.
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According to UNAIDS, 1.4 million Ugandans are living with HIV.
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Last year 53,000 people were newly infected with the disease in the East African country, the UN agency said.
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