Vietnam police bust ring selling 'recycled condoms'

Police have confiscated hundreds of thousands of used condoms in a Vietnamese warehouse that were boiled, reshaped and sold as new despite health risks.

Police bust Vietnam crooks cleaning 324,000 used condoms in bid to resell them. Source: Binh Duong police

Police in Vietnam have confiscated an estimated 345,000 used condoms which had been cleaned and resold as new, state media reported.

Footage broadcast by state-owned Vietnam Television (VTV) this week showed dozens of large bags containing the used contraceptives scattered across the floor of a warehouse in the southern province of Binh Duong.

Police said the bags weighed over 360 kilograms, equivalent to 345,000 condoms, according to VTV.

Condoms were boiled and reshaped using wooden instruments. Source: VTV

The owner of the warehouse said they had received a "monthly input of used condoms from an unknown person," state newspaper Tuoi Tre reported.

A woman detained during the bust told police that the used prophylactics were first boiled in water then dried and reshaped on a wooden phallus before being repackaged and resold.

VTV said it was not clear how many of the recycled condoms had already been sold. The detained woman said she had received $0.17 ($0.24) for every kilogramme of recycled condoms she produced.

Neither she nor the owner of the warehouse were available for comment.

The state newspaper Tuoi Tre quoted a health official as saying the recycled condoms posed an extreme health risk to users.