NATION : Virus Exposure ‘Unacceptable’
The possible exposure of 120 people to a fatal leukemia virus was “an unacceptable break in procedure” but probably didn’t put anyone at serious risk, University of Pennsylvania officials said today.
About 20 veterinary students and staff and 100 visiting preschool children unknowingly handled 14 newborn lambs that had been inoculated with a slow-acting virus, HTLV-1. The human T-cell lymphotropic virus can cause a lethal form of leukemia in people but does not grow in sheep.
“It was an unacceptable break of procedure,” said Penn’s vice provost for research, Barry Cooperman.
Penn officials investigating the violation are now waiting for test results of blood samples from those people exposed to the animals in April to determine if they were infected, Cooperman said.
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