Two Scientists Charged With Smuggling Deactivated Mpox Virus Into U.S.

Two scientists at a U.S. government laboratory were charged with smuggling vials of deactivated mpox virus into the country from Africa without required permits and lying to investigators about the materials. The charges were announced Tuesday after a criminal complaint was unsealed in federal court in Detroit.

The complaint names Vincent Munster, chief of the virus ecology section at Rocky Mountain Laboratories in Hamilton, Montana, and Claude Kwe, who works with him.

Kwe were stopped at Detroit Metropolitan Airport in January after arriving on a flight from Paris following nine days in the Republic of Congo. According to the FBI, Munster told investigators that any necessary documents were in his laptop and stated, "you don't need them.

" Tests later showed the pair were carrying vials of deactivated mpox that had not been declared or authorized for import. The FBI said Munster "adamantly denied" returning with biological materials.

"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," said Marcus Sykes of the Office of Inspector General at the Department of Health and Human Services.

Munster and Kwe are scheduled to appear in federal court in Missoula, Montana, on Wednesday. No reason for transporting the deactivated virus was stated in the court filing. The scientists have worked on mpox research, the FBI said. Mpox, previously known as monkeypox, was first identified in 1958 and caused a global outbreak in 2022 after spreading through sexual contact for the first time.