Health Alert : Some Chinese Hair Bands Made From Recycled Condoms

A few years ago, one of my very good friends who is an office manager at the company I used to work for unleashed a college tale on me. Now, let me tell you a little bit about her first. She is a staunch Republican, extremely conservative and drives a minivan. She is a church-going woman and has two of the most well-mannered children I have ever met. But, evidently she had a bit of a wild streak during her more liberal college years with tales of keg parties gone bad, breaking into football stadiums in her native New Jersey and mass producing condom earrings. Yes, you heard me right. This conservative woman used to make quite the college living making handcrafted earrings made of condoms. Oh, to hear the pride in her voice as she reminisced about the earrings she would make out of colored condoms, ribbed condoms, xx-large condoms and the like. Evidently, they were quite the seller in her college years because she was able to finance some of her wilder cross-country trips with this side condom business. I was reminded of my friend’s business after reading a recent news article about another business trying to make a killing in China: hair bands made from condoms.

Now, I did not tell my friend that I would rather not have condoms (still in their packages usually) dangling from my ears, nor would I like to have reportedly “used” condoms wound through my already unmanageable hair. I have enough bad hair days as it is without throwing used condoms in the mix, thank you very much. According to the newspaper China Daily, residents in the southern Chinese region of Pearl River Delta are stocking up on rubber bands and hair bands that have been recycled from used condoms. Because they are so inexpensive, they have been selling like hotcakes. The regional newspaper cites their popularity to the fact that they are so “cheap and colorful.” We should add “very unsanitary” to that description. Shouldn’t that go without saying? Clearly, the locals have no problem with the fact that these seemingly innocent hair bands could be literally fatal to their health.

A dermatologist out of the Guangzhou Hospital of Armed Police who wanted to go only by the name Dong states, “There are a lot of bacteria and viruses on the rubber bands and hair ties made from used condoms. People could be infected with AIDS, warts or other diseases if they hold the rubber bands or strings in their mouths while weaving their hair into plaits or buns.” Like most women, I do tend to hold hair bands in my mouth while attempting to tame my unruly mane into some kind of bun or ponytail, so it seems pretty disgusting, to say the least. Still the bags of 10 hair ties that go for approximately 25 fen or 3 cents are selling out at regional markets.