National Institutes of Health (NIH) workers reportedly found a box left in their storage room containing six vials of smallpox.
The NIH employees were preparing to move their lab in Bethesda, Maryland, when they found the glass tubes filled with the virus.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced on Tuesday that the employees found the box on July 1. The cardboard box was "in an unused portion of a storage room" and seemed to be dated as far back as the 1950s. Six vials, all of which were freeze-dried and frozen, were found intact and sealed.
The CDC confirmed there was no evidence the vials had been opened, and no lab workers appeared to have been exposed to them. The employees instantaneously transferred the vials into a containment lab and were transported to the CDC facility in Atlanta via aircraft, the Los Angeles Times reported.
NIH officials are currently testing to see whether any of the vials contain viable cultures that can grow and cause infections. Any active cultures found will be immediately disposed of, though experts believed that it might not pose any serious threat, since it has been stagnant for decades.
There is not yet a specific treatment for smallpox, which is considered a serious, contagious, and sometimes fatal disease. Vaccination is a proper means by which people can protect themselves. Symptoms of small pox include raised bumps on the face and body, and fever.
The CDC couldn't explain why the box was left in the Maryland lab. But, officials suspected the box may have been accidentally left behind when the laboratories were moved to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration from the National Institutes of Health in 1972.
Aside from the smallpox vials, NIH employees also discovered 10 vials with contents that haven't yet been identified.
