The U.S. government intends to incinerate $9.7 million in already-purchased birth control in Belgium after U.S.A.I.D shut down. Destruction may have already started.

The Trump administration’s plans to incinerate $9.7 million in birth control pills and other contraceptives stored in a Belgian warehouse have left European governments struggling as they try to prevent the destruction.

When the Trump administration abruptly defunded and dismantled the United States Agency for International Development, or U.S.A.I.D., earlier this year, millions of contraceptives it had purchased were stuck in Geel, Belgium. The pills, intrauterine devices and hormonal implants were destined for clinics in the poorest countries in Africa.

With the contraceptives in limbo, the contractor managing the supply explored selling it to outside organizations, including the United Nations’ main sexual and reproductive health agency, the U.N. Population Fund. The nonprofit MSI Reproductive Choices offered to take over the warehousing and redistribute the contraceptives at no cost to the United States.

But last month it emerged that the U.S. government had instead decided to burn the supplies, at a cost to the government of more than $160,000 in transport and incineration fees.

“U.S.A.I.D. was allegedly dismantled to prevent future wastage and to deliver value for money for the American people,” said Sarah Shaw, the associate director of advocacy at MSI Reproductive Choices. “It’s just egregious that they’re willing to waste $9 million worth of contraceptives that are so desperately needed.”

She added, “Women are going to die because they’ve not had access to those contraceptives.”

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A woman in. a room with medical equipment.

Orna Angira, a nurse, working at the family planning department at Makadara Hospital in Nairobi, Kenya, which has received contraceptives through U.S.A.I.D.Credit...Brian Otieno for The New York Times

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A mostly empty shelf.

A shelf with few family planning products at Makadara Hospital.Credit...Brian Otieno for The New York Times

The decision to destroy the contraceptives has created alarm in Brussels and France as politicians scramble to figure out if the supplies have physically left the warehouse and how they can prevent their destruction.

The State Department confirmed in a statement that “a preliminary decision was made to destroy certain” birth control products. It declined to say exactly why the decision was made or to specify the current location or status of the products.

The department said the contraceptives that had been flagged for destruction were “abortifacient,” meaning that they work by inducing abortion. None of the supplies registered for storage in the Belgian warehouse fit that description, and U.S.A.I.D. was forbidden by law to purchase such products.

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The department did not reply to repeated requests for clarification.

While earlier reports suggested that the supplies would be destroyed by the end of July in France, European governments, advocacy groups and an American congressional office all said they did not know whether the burning had actually begun.

It is not clear why the government would not sell or donate the contraceptives. The department, in its statement, referred to policies preventing the U.S. government from providing aid to overseas nongovernmental organizations that provide or help with access to abortions, based on a rule that the Trump administration reinstated.

And the United States recently refused to work with the U.N. Population Fund, citing other government policies.

The dissolution of U.S.A.I.D. has created a huge gap in the supply chain of contraceptives for the world’s poorest countries, because the United States was a major donor.

Siobhan Perkins, who was the procurement adviser for the U.S.A.I.D. contraception supply chain, said the products slated for destruction were enough to prevent approximately 362,000 unintended pregnancies, 110,000 unsafe abortions and 718 maternal deaths.

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Three people stand in a line.

Patients lining up at the pharmacy of Makadara Hospital.Credit...Brian Otieno for The New York Times

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A woman outside cement buildings.

Makadara Hospital in Nairobi. Credit...Brian Otieno for The New York Times

The contraceptive supplies in the Belgian warehouse would have been enough to supply Senegal for three years, Ms. Shaw, of the reproductive health group, said. Most of the products have a remaining shelf life of several years.

European governments are still hoping to stop the incineration. The Belgian government’s foreign office has been in talks with its American counterparts about an alternative plan.

“Foreign Affairs is exploring all possible avenues to prevent the destruction of these stocks, including their temporary relocation,” Florinda Baleci, a spokeswoman for the department, said in an email on Tuesday. She said that she could not confirm or deny whether the stock was still in Geel and that Belgium had “not officially received any information to the contrary.”

Attempts at negotiating a solution have, so far, been unsuccessful. The U.N. population agency spent weeks in April trying to buy the contraceptives from the United States’ contractor, said Udara Bandara, the U.N. official handling those negotiations.

He said the American side missed an April 25 deadline to discuss the terms of the deal and then missed another deadline on April 30. On May 8, the contractor wrote to ask if the U.N. group was still interested in the purchase. It was.

Mr. Bandara said he never heard back.

If the Belgian talks fall through, it is not clear what else European officials can do.

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A woman holds a baby and two women sit at a table.

A clinic in Accra, Ghana, that has received contraception from U.S.A.I.D., in 2023. Credit...Natalija Gormalova for The New York Times

Politicians on the left in France have urged the government to seize the stockpile.

“We cannot allow an anti-choice ideology to be imposed on us within our own borders,” Marine Tondelier, the head of France’s Green party, wrote last month in an open letter to President Emmanuel Macron.

But France’s government has suggested that it cannot legally seize the drugs.

And while Mélissa Camara, a French member of European Parliament for the Greens, wrote the European Commission was asking it to intervene diplomatically, the commission has merely said it is monitoring the situation and exploring solutions.

Aurelien Breeden and Koba Ryckewaert contributed reporting.

A correction was made on Aug. 7, 2025: An earlier version of this article misstated the estimate of unsafe abortions that the contraceptives set for destruction could prevent. It is 110,000, not 1,110,000.

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