Female Health’s condom available, no U.S. retail yet

Female Health Co’s new version of its female condom is now available to state health agencies and nonprofit organizations, but the company is still trying to make it more widely available in stores.

The condom, known as FC2, will cost about 30 percent less than the original version at less than a dollar apiece, the company said on Thursday.

FC2, approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in March, will be available at Washington, D.C.-area CVS stores in December, Female Health’s senior strategic adviser Mary Ann Leeper told Reuters. Female Health is still seeking a marketing partner to help advertise and sell the product and is in talks with several companies, she added.

“We need the other company to really make a dent into the consumer market,” she said.

The original female condom never had a large following in the United States, where consumers complained it made too much noise and spoiled intimacy. The FC2 uses a new, softer material that the company says is quieter and should be more acceptable.

But the female condom is used widely overseas, especially in countries hard-hit by HIV, where women see it as a way to protect themselves even if their male partners won’t. The U.S. Agency for International Development, which lobbied for the FC2’s approval, has said it plans to distribute it for global programs that aim to curb HIV.

U.S. state health departments and organizations such as Planned Parenthood can also buy it for their programs, which the company hopes will start to spread the word about the product’s improvements.

While FC2 may face an uphill battle at the retail level, it could see greater use with its new lower price.

The original female condom retailed for as much as $4 each. The new material and manufacturing have lowered the price of the new version from distributors to no more than 82 cents per condom, the company said. Male condoms, available in a variety of brands and styles, can cost as little as 50 cents apiece.

Representatives for CVS Caremark Corp, which operates CVS stores, could not be immediately reached for comment.

Shares of Female Health were down 5.7 percent to $4.76 in afternoon trading on Nasdaq.

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Canada bans fruit-flavored cigarettes

Canada has banned the manufacture, importation and sale of most flavored cigarettes and small cigars, which have been slammed as little more than an enticement to get children to start smoking.

The law, which came into effect on Thursday, was backed by both government and opposition lawmakers. It also bans tobacco advertising in newspapers and magazines, closing a loophole that had allowed ads in publications that claimed they were read only by adults.

Anti-smoking groups said fruit-flavored cigarettes were marketed like candy to lure young smokers, but the industry complained the law was too broad and would unfairly restrict importation of U.S.-grown burley tobacco.

Lawmakers in U.S. tobacco-growing states have complained the law will cost U.S. jobs, and a U.S. Senator has been blocking the appointment of a White House trade official in a bid to make the Obama administration put pressure on Canada.

Anti-smoking groups say the jobs complaint is unfounded since Canada did not import any U.S.-grown burley tobacco in 2007 and 2008, and “American-style” cigarettes make up less than 1 percent of the Canadian market.

“The trade argument was invented out of thin air,” said Rob Cunningham of the Canadian Cancer Society.

The Canadian ban is more sweeping than one imposed last month by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration because it also includes small cigars. Nether ban includes menthol-flavored cigarettes.

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Female Health’s condom available, no U.S. retail yet

Female Health’s condom available, no U.S. retail yet

Canada bans fruit-flavored cigarettes

Canada bans fruit-flavored cigarettes