Missing Vial of Deadly Virus: Should Researchers Experiment with Death?

Death in a little glass bottle: a vial containing a sample of Guanarito, a deadly hemorrhagic fever from Venezuela, has mysteriously disappeared from the Galveston National Laboratory on the campus of the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB).

Officials are trying to reassure those of us who might be worried by saying they think the vial might have gotten stuck to something, maybe broken on the floor of the lab, and harmlessly disposed of in cleanup. But our Galveston injury attorneys point out that the simple fact is that they don’t know what happened to the vial. And the ongoing investigation at UTMB might not turn up anything concrete either.

What was in the Missing Vial of Deadly Virus at UTMB?

The missing vial of deadly virus apparently contained less than a fourth of a teaspoon of the hemorrhagic disease Guanarito. It’s a favorite disease target for government research because it’s one of those that could potentially be used by terrorists as a weapon. Now that’s really reassuring….

The vial was kept in a locked freezer at UTMB. Employees with access to the freezer have apparently been screened by security. And officials say, for what it’s worth, that there’s been no security breach…. But last Tuesday, an investigator discovered that one of the five vials of Guanarito had mysteriously gone missing. (Source: Erin Mulvaney, Houston Chronicle, 3/24/13)

Personally, I don’t find the statement that the vial might have simply stuck to something, fallen on the floor, broken, and gotten cleaned up (all without anyone noticing) very reassuring. Does anyone remember that story The Andromeda Strain? The Galveston injury attorneys at Denena Points, PC do not want to see a real-life sequel called The Guanarito Strain.

Should the Government Experiment with Deadly Diseases?

This incident might cause you to examine the question of whether the government and its researchers should be playing with these deadly diseases like Guanarito at all. Do you remember reading a few years back about the effort to revive the deadly strain of flu that wiped out millions during the World War I era? Do you wonder what the real end results of such efforts might be? What if someone loses samples of the experimental disease? Or accidentally drops a vial at the wrong place at the wrong time?

And what about the conscientious efforts to preserve samples of smallpox after vaccines had essentially wiped out the disease across the globe? I’m probably not alone in wanting to say good riddance to such diseases and to see the very last microbe extinguished.

Our Galveston injury attorneys mention that we all have quite enough problems in life without government researchers and those with access to their laboratories creating additional challenges for us. For one thing, supplies of medications and drug therapies have an alarming tendency to become compromised by contaminants and defects. This past week just saw two major recalls of drug lots from U.S. compounding pharmacies due to visible contaminants in the medications. Read more about the latest compounding pharmacy recall scare. Click on this article by our Galveston injury attorneys.