Radio 4 hosts debate on 'fun' contact lenses

Radio 4's long-established You & Yours, which broadcast the item on August 6, interviewed optician editor Chris Bennett on the subject.
'If your child decides to wear a cosmetic contact lens and then swaps it with one of their friends' lenses, any eye diseases that your child's friend has got will be passed to your son or daughter, and vice versa,' he told listeners.
Association of Optometrists spokesman David Craig debated the current situation with Kashol Pungi, managing director of Fashion Wear Services, introduced as 'the main manufacturer of these lenses'.
Craig said there were two main risks to wearers Ð that there was no initial assessment of the contact lens wearer, and 'no adequate instruction for cleaning the lenses or wearing them' Ð and that there was anecdotal evidence from optometrists that there were problems.
Pungi, who sells the Four Eyez brand, said: 'If there was a problem with our lenses Ð which we've been selling for six years Ð shops like Argos and The Gadget Shop wouldn't keep selling them. We've increased sales by four times in the last three months.'
Pungi claimed that he personally checked any returns, and 'had not had any major complaints'.
Nevertheless, Craig called Four Eyez's website instructions for care and insertion of lenses 'frankly inadequate'.
The programme also heard from teenagers who have tried swapping lenses, with one stating that if she had stopped to think carefully, there would have been no possibility of her using her friend's lenses.
'There's no way I would use her toothbrush or any other personal things of hers,' she said, 'so there's no reason why contact lenses should be any different.'
To hear Radio 4's Wednesday's broadcast go to: www.bbc. co.uk/radio4/youandyours/