Johnson & Johnson recalls Acuvue lenses

 Health giant Johnson & Johnson has issued its ninth recall of a consumer health product in a year, this time covering millions of 1 Day Acuvue contact lenses sold in Japan and two dozen other countries in Asia and Europe.

The affected contact lenses were mostly sold in Japan. Other boxes were sold in Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong and South Korea. The rest were sold in European countries. None were sold in the United States or Canada, the company said.

Johnson & Johnson said Monday that it had received a limited number of complaints from customers in Japan that they experienced an unusual stinging or pain when inserting the Acuvue TruEye Brand contact lenses.

J&J, based in New Brunswick, N.J., said it has not received any reports of customers suffering damage to their vision.

"The risk of long-term health consequences is very unlikely," said Gary Esterow, spokesman for Johnson & Johnson Vision Care Inc.

He said the company estimates about 100,000 boxes were affected, with the boxes containing either 30 or 90 lenses each.