On 22 October 2020 the Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine notified my Department that it had removed ViraPro hand sanitiser from the product register. On the same day my Department removed the supplier of Virapro and its entire product offering from the Education Sector PPE Procurement Agreement and advised all schools to cease all use of these products. These products have been on general sale and not just available through the education sector framework. On Friday 23rd the Department of Agriculture further advised not to use any Virapro branded product and this was communicated to schools, with the instruction to store the product pending collection by the supplier.
On foot of these notifications arrangements were also made to bring to the attention of the wider Department and its aegis bodies guidance on the product recall, and on the follow-on decision to remove from the approved list of products under the Education Sector PPE Procurement Agreement 52 other products which were not subject to the product recall but whose registration status could not be confirmed.
Based on data supplied by Maxxcare, the supplier of Virapro, it is estimated that 10% of schools have been supplied with Virapro. The total value of the product supplied is estimated to be between €200,000 to €300,000. This estimated value is based on sales data and therefore it is expected that the value of the product to be recalled is lower given some product would have been used since purchased. The Department will continue to monitor the situation and update data as it becomes available.
