A multimillion-dollar laboratory operated by the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) in Galveston, Texas has lost a vial containing a deadly virus.
The virus, called Guanarito, causes symptoms similar to Ebola, reports ABC News.
Guanarito can bring on hemorrhagic fever in infected people, which causes “bleeding under the skin, in internal organs or from body orifices like the mouth, eyes, or ears,” according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
There have been “at least several hundred cases” of human disease in areas of Venezuela where the virus is common, NIH’s director of the Office of Biodefense Research Affairs, Michael Kurilla, told ABC News.
UTMB’s president David L. Callender maintains that there was no breach in the facility’s security.
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