By Pang Qi

A large portion of the colored contact lenses which are allegedly imported in their original packaging from South Korea and sold in China are of substandard quality, the Beijing Optometric and Optical Association (BOOA) said Tuesday. This statistic refers to two types of products: the first are smuggled into China and the second are made here, allegedly by South Korean nationals.

Many colored contact lenses enter China illegally

A BOOA member, who is involved in the colored contact lens business and spoke on condition of anonymity, told the Global Times that the quality of colored contact lenses made in South Korea is strictly controlled by the country's government – and those that do not meet the specifications end up in China.

He said that after the lenses were rejected in South Korea, those involved in the trade apply for a permit to make them legal in China – using the South Korean registration numbers – and the Chinese authorities fail to realize that they are substandard goods.

And the smuggling of colored contact lens between the two countries has increased, the insider said. "At the beginning, the South Korean business people declared a small part of their substandard goods at the Chinese customs and smuggled the rest, and now they declare an even smaller amount," he said. "To estimate optimistically, not more than 3 to 5 percent of the goods have been declared at our customs."

The insider added that some 20 South Korean factory owners of banned colored contact lenses are now operating factories inside China. They produce goods without any permit, give them a fake label, and sell them to Chinese consumers.

"Some brands, like HANA, apply for permits in both countries but only sell in China. After they close down their operation in China they return to South Korea and change their brand name. They then came back with the new name, continuing to sell here," he said.

China's contact lens market lacks supervision

One woman from Henan Province reportedly almost lost her sight because of colored contact lenses bought on the internet, according to Dahe Daily.

And the Yangtze Evening Post reported Monday that some contact lenses sold online or in small shops are in fact recycling used ones, and the vendors put them back on the market for sale. According to the report, some people sell their used contact lenses for eight yuan ($1.2) per lens, and they are then sold for 20 yuan ($3) per lens.

In the Category of Medical Device Classification of China's State Food and Drug Administration (SFDA), contact lenses are identified as a medical device, and require strict management and control.

And Liu Duoning, the secretary general of BOOA, told the Global Times that all organizations involved in the contact lens retailing and wholesale business are required to hold a permit as a business involved in the sale of medical instruments issued by their local food and drug administration office. Liu also said that anyone who sells them without the permit is considered to be operating illegally.

Liu added that opticians should test customers' eyes and issue a prescription before they sell contact lenses. But not all retailers obey the regulations, and some "don't know whether the contact lenses their customers buy are suitable for them."

The BOOA insider also said that many shops selling colored contact lenses do not have a permit to do so, such as shops in Huawei Center and the 77th Street shopping center located on Xidan, one of the busiest shopping areas in Beijing.

He also said that most shop owners in such places know that they should hold such a permit, but consumers do not know about the regulation.

Regarding the internet market for colored contact lens, the insider said that the vast majority of the online shoppers are selling them illegally, as they do not meet the strict requirements for opening an online shop selling contact lenses. He added that people who sell contact lenses on the web should first have a store with a permit, and a warehouse to stock goods safely.

"You can only get the permit to sell if the store area exceeds 60 square meters," said a contact lens shop owner at Beijing's Pan Jiayuan Eyeglasses Center – which does have a permit. "As it is much more difficult to get a permit for sales online, we are therefore unable to conduct any business on the web."

According to the insider, among the tens of thousands of contact lens online shops, only a few of them are truly legal.

And Liu told the Global Times that the association can only try to make sure that its members maintain legal operations, but cannot do anything with regard to other shops. "The supervision of the contact lens market relies only on the government," he said.

But the director of the Division of Manufacturing and Distribution Supervision at the Department of Medical Device Supervision, SFDA, told the Global Times that, though they know that the operation permits are required if people want to sell medical equipment, they are not sure whether contact lenses are identified as medical equipment, and if they can be sold online.

Shops: permits, but little awareness

At the seven contact lens shops at Pan Jiayuan Eyeglasses Center that a Global Times reporter visited, two of them had no permit to sell contact lenses, and the ones who did have the permit displayed it prominently. Two shop owners who did not have a permit apparently knew they were in violation of regulations, as one of them said the shop had applied for a permit, and the other one said it had a "training certificate" to sell contact lenses.

But most of the seven stores were not aware of the problems surrounding the color contact lens.

However, one shop assistant said that some South Korean products are "less comfortable" than those with the required official documentation.

An officer at the China Consumers' Association (CCA) told the Global Times that they have not received complaints about South Korean contact lenses – and the contact lens insider said this is actually not surprising. "How can you  complain about a product if it doesn't even have a real registration code?"