Tens of millions of used medical gloves with traces of blood and other contaminants were brought into the country from Thailand.

The CNN investigation has revealed a “coronavirus conspiracy” involving the import of millions of second-hand nitrile gloves from Thailand into the United States.

It is noted that dirty nitrile gloves with traces of blood and waste were collected in Thailand, washed and tinted with blue paint. 

The demand for them has increased significantly since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. According to investigative journalists, glove fraud could run into billions of dollars. 

Despite the fact that the authorities of the United States and Thailand are conducting criminal investigations into the revealed facts, there may still be millions of used personal protective equipment in warehouses in America, according to CNN. 

It is not yet possible to fully understand the problem, since due to the pandemic, the United States introduced a temporary relaxation of the rules for the import of medical equipment. 

An independent investigation conducted at a Los Angeles warehouse and validated by CNN revealed that the majority of the gloves he purchased were not nitrile, but lower-grade latex or vinyl, with many clearly filthy and second-hand.

According to one CNN interviewee, he paid two million dollars for a shipment of Paddy the Room gloves, which came in traces of blood and dirt. 

“We start getting phone calls from clients completely upset, and you know, yelling and screaming at us saying, ‘Hey, you screwed us,'” says Tarek Kirschen – a Miami-based businessman.

“These were reused gloves. They were washed, recycled,” he told CNN.

“Some of them were dirty. Some of them had bloodstains. Some of them had markers on them with dates from two years ago… I couldn’t believe my eyes.”

After receiving complaints from customers, they refunded the money and reported the case to FDA in Feb.

In a statement, the FDA told CNN that companies could only import under the relaxed guidelines “as long as the gloves conform to the consensus standards and labeling cited in the guidance and where the gloves do not create an undue risk.”

However, few physical checks are carried on gloves or any other commodities arriving at American ports, and any fake or tainted medical gloves would most likely not be identified until they reached at their destination.

The CBP said it had seized more than 40 million counterfeit face masks and hundreds of thousands of other PPE kits.

It says it has seized some shipments of gloves, but it has not tracked the volume of seizures.

The great mystery is how many millions more substandard nitrile gloves may be stashed in US port warehouses.

According to PPE expert Doug Stein, the fraud may reach to billions of dollars.

“It just became this dark, dark underground,” he says, “where fear meets greed.”

Image Credit: CNN

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