The state Department of Health today is dropping off $250,000 worth of voluntarily forfeited OxyELITE Pro products at the HPOWER waste-to-energy plant in Campbell Industrial Park to be destroyed amid an investigation that has linked the dietary supplement to multiple cases of liver damage and acute hepatitis in the isles and around the country.

"The main reason that we’re doing this is we would like the product to be completely removed from any kind of potential sale," DOH Director Loretta Fuddy said during a news conference Monday. "Since it is recalled they can’t sell it, but we want to assure the public that it is out of the market."

Products in the OxyELITE Pro line have been embargoed from sale in Hawaii since Oct. 9. The Health Department first notified the public Sept. 26 that it suspected the dietary supplements were linked to cases of severe liver damage and failure.

On Oct. 11 the U.S. Food and Drug Administration told USPlabs, the manufacturer of OxyELITE Pro, to stop distribution of OxyELITE Pro and another product, VERSA-1, because the FDA had discovered both contain aegeline, an herbal extract that doesn’t have a history of use in the United States or evidence of safety.

On Nov. 9, USPlabs officially recalled the questionable OxyELITE Pro products under pressure from the FDA, which contends there is a reasonable probability that the products were adulterated. A month earlier the company voluntarily stopped distributing the product nationally when the Hawaii embargo began.

"BASED ON the recent action with the USPlabs and the recall, and in conjunction with (the) FDA, we feel now is the time to actually destroy the product," Fuddy said.

State environmental health staff members visited 20 retailers on Oahu and nine neighbor island stores Monday to collect a total of 329,509 OxyELITE Pro capsules and 83,000 ounces of the supplement in powder form — estimated to be worth about $250,000, Fuddy said.

Anyone still possessing or using the product is encouraged by DOH to return it to the place of purchase for proper disposal.

So far, the department’s investigation has associated OxyELITE Pro with 36 cases of liver damage and acute hepatitis in Hawaii. Fuddy said that in 82 percent of those cases, patients had been using only OxyELITE Pro.

For a while the department was identifying only cases that physicians reported treating between April and around the end of September. But that’s changed.

"Unfortunately, we continue to pick up new cases because of the fact that there are apparently some people who amazingly still have not heard of all your reports," state epidemiologist Dr. Sarah Park told reporters Monday. "Clearly, our job is not done."

She added, "There are also folks who have heard the reports and just believe that the cases that we’ve identified took more than the recommended dosage … (but) that is not the case."

Park said all of the liver damage cases the department linked to OxyELITE Pro involved patients who were not deviating from the recommended dosage.

State and federal officials have yet to pinpoint what has caused dozens of isle residents to get sick, two to need liver transplants, and the death of a Maui woman.

While the Hawaii investigation continues, cases are slowly coming to light on the mainland.

"We’re beginning to see a pickup in cases nationally," Fuddy said. "But they’re much more diverse, and so each individual doctor may only see one or two patients and they are not connecting the dots.

"So part of the reason for making this public is also to let the rest of the nation know to pay attention to this dietary supplement."