In a fairly massive and worrying mistake, the United States government has inadvertently sent the anthrax virus from Pentagon to a series of research labs within the country and even a military base located in South Korea, causing panic.
Not long after 9/11, the country (and the rest of the world) went through a time of panic when biological weapons started rising within the more common public, and this news of the anthrax virus Pentagon mistake gives off the worst kind of memories from that time, as a feeling of general unsafety rises in the face of seemingly poorly controlled biological weaponry within the country.
According to The Wall Street Journal, the anthrax virus Pentagon scandal began when the Department of Defense stated publicly that, by mistake, they'd sent live samples of the virus from a research facility to labs in nine different states throughout the country, besides a military base in South Korea.
The Guardian reports that the original anthrax virus Pentagon mistake occurred at an unspecified time in Dugway, Utah, where there's a US Defense Department research laboratory in charge of dealing with this kind of virus, such as the Bacillus anthracis, the scientific name for the bacteria that ultimately causes the disease.
The anthrax illness, which comes from a natural virus that'll often only attack animals, has serious effects on the lungs such as respiratory collapse, as well as gastrointestinal infection and even skin infections such as necrotic ulcers - which is why the thought of a anthrax virus from Pentagon is so positively terrifying.
"There is no known risk to the general public, and there are no suspected or confirmed cases of anthrax infection in potentially exposed lab workers," said Army Col. Steve Warren, Pentagon spokesman, according to The Washington Post. "Out of an abundance of caution, [the Defense Department] has stopped the shipment of this material from its labs pending completion of the investigation."
Warren then added that the Department of Defense was working closely with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to better understand how the anthrax virus Pentagon problem happened.
