U.S. lab scientists charged with smuggling deactivated mpox virus
Two scientists at a U.S. government lab have been charged with smuggling vials of deactivated mpox virus into the country from Africa and lying about it during interviews with investigators at a Michigan airport, authorities said Tuesday, reports BritPanorama.
A criminal complaint was unsealed in federal court in Detroit against Vincent Munster, chief of the virus ecology section at Rocky Mountain Laboratories in Hamilton, Montana, and his colleague Claude Kwe.
Munster and Kwe were stopped at Detroit Metropolitan Airport in January after a flight from Paris, where they had spent nine days in the Republic of Congo. An outbreak of the mpox disease has been linked to more than 2,000 deaths in Congo, although a two-year outbreak was declared over in April.
According to the FBI, Munster “adamantly denied” returning to the U.S. with biological materials or samples. However, tests subsequently revealed that the scientists were traveling with vials of deactivated mpox, yet they failed to declare them or obtain the necessary permission.
“Any deliberate effort to conceal and smuggle biological materials into the United States without proper authorization is a breach of the public’s trust and could have placed the public at risk,” remarked Marcus Sykes from the Office of Inspector General at the Department of Health and Human Services.
Munster and Kwe did not immediately respond to requests for comment. They are expected to appear in federal court in Missoula, Montana, on Wednesday. An email seeking comment was also sent to HHS, the lab’s parent agency.
The court filing did not elaborate on why Munster and Kwe may have wanted to bring the deactivated mpox virus to their lab. However, they are both virologists with extensive experience in mpox research, as noted by the FBI.
During their encounter with investigators at the Detroit area airport, Munster claimed that any necessary documents were saved on his laptop, adding, “but you don’t need them. I do this all the time,” according to the FBI.
“It is reasonable to believe that Munster’s statements regarding the possession of the required documentation to customs officers were materially false,” the FBI stated.
Common symptoms of mpox, as outlined by the World Health Organization, include a rash and fever; it can sometimes lead to serious illness, although most individuals fully recover.
Initially identified in 1958 during outbreaks of a “pox-like” illness in monkeys, mpox, formerly known as monkeypox, saw most human cases among individuals in central and West Africa who were in close contact with infected animals until recent years.
In 2022, the virus was confirmed to have spread via sex for the first time, leading to outbreaks in over 70 countries that had not previously reported mpox.
