Bausch & Lomb has removed a possibly dangerous new product from nationwide shelves

Blindness from a contact lens? It's hard to get any more counterproductive than that. Therefore, Bausch & Lomb Inc. had no choice this week but to permanently remove from markets worldwide a solution that has been linked by health authorities to an outbreak of rare fungal infections that can cause blindness.

"Bausch & Lomb's top priority is the safety of our customers, and we want them to have complete confidence in our products," said the eye-care product maker's chief executive, Ronald Zarrella.

In early May, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the number of confirmed cases of Fusarium keratitis in the United States had climbed to 122, most of them contact-lens wearers who reported using Bausch & Lomb's newest cleaner, ReNu with MoistureLoc MultiPurpose Solution.

Sales of the product were halted in the U.S. on April after the The company halted U.S. sales of MoistureLoc on April 13 after the CDC said it was investigating an unusual spike in infections in Americans using the lens.

Such a fungus is commonly found in plant material, as well as soil in tropical and subtropical areas. Without eye-drop treatment, which can last two to three months, the infection can scar the cornea and blind its victims. At least eight U.S. patients have required cornea transplants.

Zarrella did point out that extensive federal inspections of the company's factory in Greenville, S.C., where MoistureLoc was made for U.S. and several Asian markets, have not turned up evidence of "contamination, tampering, counterfeiting or sterility failure." He went on to state that "we are continuing to investigate this link, but in the meantime, we're taking the most responsible action in the interests of our customers by discontinuing the MoistureLoc formula."

The recall is limited to MoistureLoc and does not involve other solutions in its ReNu line, including the more widely used MultiPlus brand - which some victims reported using.

Of the more than 30 million Americans who wear contact lenses, about 2.3 million use MoistureLoc, which was introduced in late 2004 and accounted for $100 million in global sales last year.

While the CDC reiterated that the origin of this outbreak remains a mystery, some eye specialists theorized that MoistureLoc's unique disinfecting and moisturizing agents could have played a role.