USAID Ordered $8M in Contraceptives Destroyed, Then Reversed
Summary
USAID paid a contractor for $9.7 million in family-planning commodities -- birth control pills, IUDs, injectable contraceptives -- bought for global distribution and stored in a warehouse in Geel, Belgium. After a January 2025 executive order paused foreign aid, USAID terminated the contract and, in June 2025, ordered the commodities destroyed. Chemonics moved 20 of 24 truckloads out of climate-controlled storage to carry that out -- then USAID reversed the order. [USAID's own Inspector General](https://oig.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/2026-06/Management%20Advisory_Family%20Planning%20Commodities%20in%20Belgium%20Need%20Final%20Disposition%20Instructions%20%281%29_0.pdf) found the reversal came too late: those 20 truckloads, now valued at $8 million, are largely unviable and sitting in storage anyway. More than a year after the contract ended, USAID still hasn't decided what to do with any of it -- and has paid $360,667 in storage and freight fees along the way.
A contract killed by an executive order
Under its Global Health Supply Chain-Procurement and Supply Management (GHSC-PSM) award with contractor Chemonics International, bought contraceptives -- hormonal implants, injectable birth control, and related supplies -- for distribution through its global health programs. On January 20, 2025, the White House issued Executive Order 14169⧉, "Reevaluating and Realigning United States Foreign Aid," pausing U.S. foreign assistance pending review. issued Chemonics a stop-work order a week later and formally terminated the family-planning task order on March 14, 2025, after determining the activity was unaligned with the administration's priorities -- even though Congress had appropriated the funding⧉ for family-planning programs specifically, through the FY2024 Further Consolidated Appropriations Act and subsequent continuing resolutions.
View data as table
| Rendered unusable after the reversed destruction order | 8,000,000 |
|---|---|
| Still viable, if USAID decides in time | 1,700,000 |
Destroy. Then don't. Then destroy again. Then don't.
Chemonics gave two options on April 28, 2025: destroy the commodities for an estimated $166,940, or resell them, potentially recovering 70-80% of their purchase cost -- up to $7.2 million. USAID chose neither cleanly⧉. On June 20, it ordered all $9.7 million in commodities destroyed. Chemonics spent two weeks in July moving 20 of 24 truckloads out of the climate-controlled Regional Distribution Center to an overflow facility to carry that out -- then told Chemonics on July 22 to pause the remaining four truckloads. On September 12, ordered the destruction resumed for all 24 truckloads, then reversed that instruction the same day. Three days later, Chemonics confirmed what the delay had already cost: the 20 truckloads moved for destruction were now unviable, having lost the temperature control that kept them meeting World Health Organization manufacturing standards.
View data as table
| Jan-Feb 2026 | 17,150 | $12,100 for the 4 still-viable truckloads + $5,050 for the 20 unviable ones |
|---|---|---|
| March 2026 onward | 24,550 | $19,500 viable + $5,050 unviable -- a 43% jump driven by the commodities still worth saving |
The indecision didn't stop there. In October, at 's request, Chemonics proposed donating the four still-viable truckloads to a recipient in Uganda for an estimated $239,000 in transport and warehousing costs. In November, Chemonics offered two more options: the U.S. government could retain the commodities indefinitely, or try returning them to the manufacturer -- which has no contractual obligation to take them back. acted on none of it. OIG's last confirmation with the agency, on March 24, 2026⧉, found no final disposition instructions had been issued; didn't respond to further follow-up requests in April or May, which attributes in part to staff turnover.
A senate letter, an OIG advisory, still no answer
opened this review in response to a bipartisan December 2025 letter⧉ from Senators Jeanne Shaheen and Lisa Murkowski, who asked 's and the State Department's Inspectors General to investigate "the waste of taxpayer funds and possible fraud" in the commodities' disposition. The senators wrote they were aware "a majority of the commodities were removed from the warehouse in Geel to a non-climate-controlled warehouse, possibly to make the commodities unusable" -- an allegation of intent that 's advisory neither confirms nor denies. The senators also disputed a separate administration claim that the shipment included abortifacients -- barred from U.S. funding by law -- stating they had "first-hand knowledge" the commodities were limited to birth control pills, IUDs, and injectable birth control; 's advisory does not independently verify that claim either.
What did verify, from contract records, cost logs, and interviews with both and Chemonics officials: the advisory documents the timeline and the costs in full, but states plainly that officials "lacked information on why reversed course" and that leadership never responded to 's questions about the decision to retain the commodities or the delay in completing final disposition. No one at would explain the reversal, and no one has resolved it since.
The takeaway
- The reversal was too slow to matter. pausing the destruction order in July 2025 looks like a course correction, but the 20 truckloads had already left climate control -- found them largely unviable regardless. The decision that would have preserved the $8 million never came in time.
- Indecision has its own price tag. Every option on the table -- destroy, resell, donate, retain, return -- was cheaper than what has actually done, which is pay $360,667 to keep deciding nothing, with monthly costs still climbing on the commodities worth the most to save.
- No one answered for the choice that mattered. 's advisory makes no recommendations because there's no live compliance failure to fix -- just an open decision. But its plainest finding is that the officials who reversed a destruction order months into a public dispute never told anyone, including their own Inspector General, why.
This piece follows the figures and timeline exactly as 's management advisory states them; it makes no recommendations to and reached no finding on intent. The senators' letter that prompted the review raises two allegations -- that commodities were deliberately moved to unclimatized storage, and that the shipment did not include abortion-related items despite administration claims -- that this article reports as the senators' stated position, not as -confirmed fact, because 's advisory does not adjudicate either one. Dollar figures for commodity value reflect Chemonics' and 's own accounting as reported to , not an independent appraisal.
Sources(2) ▾
- USAID Office of Inspector General (OIG), Family Planning Commodities: USAID Should Provide Final Disposition Instructions to Stop Accruing Storage Costs for $8 Million in Unusable Items and $1.7 Million in Nearly Expired Items in Belgium (Management Advisory 1-000-26-003-A) (2026-06-10) — The full management advisory issued to the agency's performing Chief Operating Officer, including its timeline appendix (Appendix A) and cost tables, documenting more than a year of indecision over $9.7 million in family-planning commodities stranded in a Belgian warehouse after a terminated global-health contract. Fetched directly from oig.usaid.gov and converted with pdftotext -layout. oig.usaid.gov · original document
- United States Senate, Letter from Senators Jeanne Shaheen and Lisa Murkowski to the USAID and State Department Acting Inspectors General (2025-12-22) — The bipartisan congressional letter that triggered 's management advisory, requesting an investigation into the disposition of the $9.7 million in Belgium-stored commodities and raising a specific, unresolved allegation that commodities were moved out of climate-controlled storage to render them unusable. Used here for the request itself and the senators' characterization of the commodities' contents -- not as an independent source for any monetized figure, all of which trace to the advisory. foreign.senate.gov · original document
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-- the U.S. Agency for International Development, which buys and ships medical supplies for U.S.-funded global health programs -- paid for $9.7 million in family-planning commodities and stored them in a warehouse in Geel, Belgium, for distribution around the world. In 2025 the agency ordered them destroyed, started the process, reversed itself, and then did nothing further. USAID's Inspector General⧉ found that by the time changed its mind, $8 million of the commodities -- pulled out of climate-controlled storage to be destroyed -- were already spoiled. More than a year after the contract that bought them was terminated, has issued no final decision on any of it, and the U.S. government keeps paying to store goods nobody has decided what to do with.