The health ministry is stuck with an even greater stockpile of unusable face masks, gloves and other protective gear than previously revealed, the Volkskrant reported on Tuesday.

The ministry already had to declare over 30 million Chinese KN95 face masks unfit for purpose but failed to tell MPs about some hundreds of millions of other protective items which had not yet been tested.

Of those, some 308,5 million items cannot be used, a health ministry spokesman confirmed. The cost so far could be over €300m, the paper estimated, but the total tally may be even higher as the quality of over 105 million masks still has to be ascertained.

‘The items may have failed the test for many reasons,’ the spokesman said. ‘They may not fit properly, or they no longer comply with the rules.’

The Chinese masks were taken out of circulation because the European Commission had only granted a temporary permission for their use. The procurement agency LHC was warned about the risk but this did not keep it from buying more.

The government has some 1.45 billion items in storage which are fit for use but demand is down because health institutions now have their own suppliers, the paper said.

Experts say that by May and June 2022 some 300 million face masks will be rendered useless. Free distribution is not an option, caretaker health minister Hugo de Jonge has said, because it would ‘upset the market’ and that could provoke legal action by suppliers.