Australian BMX cyclist Caroline Buchanan tweeted a photograph from the athletes' village of a container of condoms with a placard reading "Kangaroos condoms" with the picture of a boxing kangaroo.

 

She joked that the container seemed to back up rumors¹ that the athletes' village becomes a hot bed of activity as thousands of competitors complete their events and celebrate after years of working to get to the Olympics.

 

"Haha, the rumors are true. Olympic village," tweeted Buchanan, whose BMX contest starts on Wednesday.

 

Barcelona started the trend of supplying free condoms to athletes when the Spanish city held the Olympics in 1992, with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) endorsing² the move to help AIDS awareness³ and prevention. The handouts⁴（宣传品） came with health information.

 

The London Olympic organizers, LOCOG, have provided 150,000 free condoms in dispensers for the 10,800 athletes at the Games. They are supplied by Durex, part of British consumer goods group Reckitt Benckiser, which paid for the supply rights.

 

A LOCOG spokeswoman said they were trying to find out who distributed the so-called Kangaroo condoms, with the container shown to hold condoms from Durex rivals Ansell Ltd, an Australian company and Pasante, a private British company.

 

She said athletes and officials were allowed to bring products into the village for their personal use.

 

"We will look into this and ask that they are not handed out to other athletes because Durex are our supplier," said the spokeswoman.

 

Organizers tightly control which brands can be promoted at the Games, striking sponsorship deals with a limited number of companies and trying to stop non-sponsors from getting free publicity⁵ on the back of the Olympics.

 

Lawrence Boon⁶, managing director of Pasante, said his company had no involvement with the distribution of condoms in the athletes' village and he suspected it was a prank⁷ by the Australian team.

 

The number of condoms supplied at London tops the 100,000 made available to athletes in Beijing four years ago.

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