Whistleblower Documents Highlight Serious Safety Concerns for NIH Virus Lab in Montana

by Paul D. Thacker 

Internal documents from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) spotlight growing public alarm about safety and the labs that perform dangerous virus studies. Last month, I broke a story that exposed NIH virologist Vincent Munster, who faced an FBI investigation after he was caught bringing back deadly viruses from Africa to his NIH lab in Montana, Rocky Mountain Laboratories. New documents show Rocky Mountain Laboratories (RML) continues to be plagued with safety problems, and NIH executives at the Montana site have yet to fix holes in their safety plan that had been revealed back in November when a monkey bit a worker.

I was given these new NIH documents by a whistleblower who said my May exclusive on Vincent Munster “blew up inside the NIH.”

“They don’t have a real protocol if you’re exposed to something at BSL-4,” the whistleblower told me about the safety practices at RML.

Biosafety Level 4 (BSL-4) is the highest safety protocol in virus research. Its precautions are used when studying the world’s most lethal pathogens—such as Ebola and Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever. The NIH has been sent copies of the whistleblower documents for comment, and I will update you with any response.

“They want to do the work at level 4 no matter the cost,” said the whistleblower. “Because they think it’s the most important work on the planet—that must be done, no matter what it takes.”

Earlier this month the Justice Department indicted Munster and one of his lab workers, charging both researchers with two felonies. Munster’s actions exposed a distressing pattern of cowboy conduct by virologists working on deadly viruses. According to the FBI’s criminal complaint Munster was caught at the airport smuggling in viruses. When law enforcement asked him if he had the required paperwork, he replied that he did.

“I do this all the time,” Munster told federal law officials in January. In fact, Munster did not have the required paperwork and has been charged with lying to law enforcement. And Munster’s statement—“I do this all the time”—raises questions of whether smuggling viruses is in fact something he does all the time.

Alarming practices at RML

Munster works at the NIH’s RML in Hamilton, Montana, where he studies maximum containment pathogens, such as Ebola. RML is one of over a dozen labs in the United States that have a BSL-4 facility. The main virology lab has been operated for many decades by Heinz Feldmann, a leading expert on viruses studied under BSL-4 conditions.

Yet emails released by Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, raise concerns that practices at RML under Feldmann have long been sloppy. An email chain dating to 2011 finds several virologists—Munster, Feldmann and researchers with EcoHealth Alliance—discussing the logistics of shipping virus samples from Africa to the States. In the final email, EcoHealth Alliance’s Jon Epstein suggests to Feldman and Munster that Munster can hand carry virus samples on a plane after they are put in a viral transport and recovery (VTR) buffer, which keeps them alive.

“I think you can take up to 2kg with you on commercial flights,” emailed EcoHealth Alliance’s Jon Epstein.

In the final week of the Biden Administration, EcoHealth Alliance was debarred from participating in federal programs due to their problematic safety practices. However, the emails released by Senator Paul do not show if these virologists followed through and did in fact transport live viruses on a commercial flight back in 2011.

One email provided by the NIH whistleblower shows that Heinz Feldmann was transferred in August 2025 to run the NIH’s Integrated Research Facility (IRF) in Maryland. A few months prior to transferring Feldmann, the NIH discovered safety violations at the IRF, which Feldmann was apparently sent in to clean up. This included a frightening instance—apparently a lover’s spat—in which a contractor cut holes in an employee’s biocontainment suit designed to protect against infection from viruses such as Ebola.

NIH leadership notified the FBI, which launched an investigation.

Since the NIH put Feldmann in charge of the IRF in Maryland last year to clean up problems at that research site, he has been splitting his schedule between Maryland and Montana. During that time, however, the Montana RML has been found to be plagued with its own safety snafus.

Whistleblower documents

Sometime in November 2025, an RML researcher was exposed to Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever “through an accidental breach of personal protective equipment.” The safety incident was never made public, however, until a Montana newspaper reported on it months later in February 2026. “The individual remained well and showed no evidence of being infected,” an NIH spokesperson told the paper in February. “They have been back at work for some time.”

The NIH updated the Montana reporter with more information in May, detailing that the exposure incident was a monkey bite. The NIH also sent the reporter a statement that makes it appear the monkey bite accident was handled in an efficient, by-the-book process, without any hitches, or delays.

Furthermore, details about Providence Hospital in Spokane seem souped-up with government acronyms and biomedical jargon to make the monkey bite patient’s treatment appear extra professional and super sciencey.

Here’s that NIH statement reported in the Montana paper:

“A November 13, 2025 workplace exposure to Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever Virus (CCHFV) occurred in the Biosafety Level 4 facility at NIH’s Rocky Mountain Laboratories. The worker is highly experienced, wore all required protective gear, and followed all established procedures at the time of the exposure. The employee was immediately decontaminated, isolated and evaluated by experienced clinical experts in coordination with highly trained safety professionals.

“The patient was transferred to the nearest Regional Emerging Special Pathogen Treatment Center (RESPTC) located at Providence Sacred Heart Medical Center & Children’s Hospital in Spokane, Washington.

“Providence is one of 13 Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR)-supported Level 1 RESPTCs, part of the tiered National Special Pathogen System (NSPS) designed to protect patients, communities and the healthcare workforce.

“Established procedures for transport, patient care, waste handling, testing and safety were followed by all involved, from lab staff and agency safety and health support to hospital care team and medical specialists.

“At no time was there any evidence of disease transmission or infection, nor was there ever any risk to staff, caregivers, or the public.”

However, NIH claims in May to the Montana newspaper about the “established procedures” in caring for the monkey bite patient are contradicted by documents provided by the whistleblower.

One document shows that Providence hospital in Spokane, which the NIH lauded in that May statement to the Montana reporter and a week later to reporters with Politico, was never part of the NIH’s plan for patient treatment, which seems to have been managed through improvisation. And notes from a June NIH meeting show the monkey bite patient’s transport—which involved approval from the governors of Montana, Idaho, and Washington—more closely resembled the 1987 road trip comedy film, “Planes, Trains, and Automobiles” than established procedures for a health emergency.

According to NIH documents, the RML staff evaluated and treated the employee on-site after the monkey bite, before sending the patient to St. Patrick’s hospital, about an hour away in Missoula. However, that hospital had staffing problems and could only take the NIH patient for three days. NIH then transferred their employee to Providence hospital in Spokane, Washington. But transportation from Montana to Washington passes through the state of Idaho.

“Had to get the approval of all 3 governors for transport through states via Spokane hospital ambulance.”

When the hospital in Spokane wanted to discharge the patient, who was found to not be sick, NIH disagreed with the hospital and felt the person needed more days of isolation. “What do you do if they become symptomatic, etc.”

NIH then transferred their employee back to RML in Montana, to finish quarantine. “Had to coordinate transport again…with backup RML personnel and emergency personnel. Required intricate communication and used GPS tracking on cell phones for security/arrival time/etc.”

However, isolating their employee at RML required modifyng a room to allow the patient to stay those three days “with bedding, towels, food, entertainment” because the room is evidently not actually designed for quarantine.

“It’s better to call this a triage room, not a quarantine room,” said the whistleblower. “People are not supposed to stay there for days. It’s a triage room.”

RML officials also discovered complications in testing the patient daily to see if they had been infected with Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever and were producing viruses. The only lab apparently capable of testing blood samples for the virus is the CDC in Atlanta. This meant catching the only flight out of nearby Missoula to ensure the patient sample made it each day to the CDC.

“Only one FedEX plane leaves Missoula each day so that restricted testing at CDC.”

The NIH’s cheerful, jargon-filled statement to the Montana paper about the critical importance of the Providence hospital in Spokane is also contradicted by the RML’s plan that was in place to handle exposures to dangerous pathogens.

That plan makes no apparent mention of the Providence hospital in Spokane which the NIH told the Montana paper last May “is one of 13 Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR)-supported Level 1 RESPTCs, part of the tiered National Special Pathogen System (NSPS) designed to protect patients, communities and the healthcare workforce.”

But the only hospital that seems to be mentioned in RML’s plan, in place at the time of the November monkey bite incident, is St. Patrick’s in Missoula.

And notes from a June NIH meeting make clear that problems remain at RML, seven months after the November monkey bite incident. The June notes show that any potentially infected worker is now first transported to St. Patrick’s in Missoula “then must figure out where to go from there.”

And while the RML had to convert their triage room last year to allow a three-day quarantine for the monkey bite patient, RML is still trying to figure out how to “modify or build new isolation suite at RML for long term isolation.”

During the November monkey bite accident, the RML realized they couldn’t get daily testing done because there is only one FedEx flight each day from Missoula to the CDC in Atlanta. But to this day they have not figured out another lab that can provide these daily tests to see if an exposed worker has started to produce viruses.

“Also need testing contract for potential RML exposures.”

Other RML problems include how the research facility handles viruses after they arrive, such as the viruses that Munster was caught smuggling into the U.S. According to RML’s current SOP, field samples received at RML will be immediately taken to the restricted access Field Sample room (2B155B). “This lab is dedicated to handling field samples and all employees with access to this lab must be enrolled in the RML Biosafety Program,” reads the SOP.

Once the collected viruses enter the Field Sample room, each sample is then divided into smaller fractions called “aliquots”. An aliquot from each sample is then sent to the Maximum Containment Lab to see if the sample might contain dangerous viruses that should only be handled at BSL-4. Other aliquots from each sample are then inactivated to kill any potentially live viruses, so they can be further analyzed.

However, the whistleblower says this protocol has a gaping hole: the Field Sample room is not secure. “There is no lock on the door, no prox access card,” said the whistleblower. “It’s shared space, and the freezers in there also don’t have locks.”

Finally, an email from Marshall Bloom, a senior RML researcher, discusses a public meeting in June he attended in Hamilton, where he was asked by local officials and members of the public about recent accidents at the RML and the Vincent Munster matter.

RML employees first learned that Munster and his lab researcher had done something wrong earlier this year, said the whistleblower, when NIH police showed up at RML and escorted them both off the RML campus, taking away all their access privileges. They were also required to surrender any government devices.

However, federal employees are prohibited from speaking about ongoing federal investigations, and even the Justice Department generally will not confirm the very existence of an investigation before charges are filed. It was only when my story broke in May that RML researchers learned Munster was being investigated by the FBI after he was caught trying to smuggle in viruses. More details did not become public until June 2, when the Justice Department announced that both Munster and his lab researcher were being charged with felonies.

Yet Marshall told the audience in Hamilton that day that this issue “was now well publicized and working its way through the criminal justice system.” He added, “We demurred providing additional information and repeatedly stressed the presumption of innocence.”

“I don’t know why the presumption of innocence,” the whistleblower said. “Don’t weigh in; don’t say anything. First, we weren’t really told anything about what happened with Munster when it all started, but he set it up like scientists are now trying to circle the wagons.”

Marshall added that, in the public discussion, the audience brought up “biological weapons, Kris Newby’s book Bitten and some more general questions about safety.”

“There’s lots of good science at RML,” said the whistleblower. “But this is a shocking example where they have found problems, and they just kept going on, without any real plan. Hoping no one would get infected. It’s just ridiculous.”

The person added one final note: “A lot of people at RML are really frustrated.”

https://disinformationchronicle.substack.com/p/exclusive-whistleblower-documents

Cabashing the Roundup Litigation

By Barbara Pfeffer Billauer JD MA (Occ. Health) PhD  

A Litigation Boom Over Roundup

The Roundup litigation craze has fed roughly 100,000 plaintiffs and their lawyers over $11 billion in settlements and verdicts since claims surrounding the world’s most widely used and highly profitable weed-killer first surfaced. It all began seven years ago with a California jury awarding a $289 million verdict against the manufacturer, Monsanto, and its parent company, Bayer. The plaintiffs suffered their share of defeats as Monsanto’s lawyers became more skillful in exposing the flaws in the causation claims presented by the plaintiffs.  Some 65,000 Roundup claims remain,  motivating the plaintiffs’ bar to troll for more clients, especially those claiming Roundup exposure caused their Non-Hodgkins Leukemia (NHL). 

But no more. Last week, the plaintiff’s litigation tsunami crashed with a monumental Supreme Court ruling. 

“There are still other claims against Monsanto that do not involve a warning.  But there is no way to spin this.  This is awful news.”

- Plaintiffs’ Lawyers Ronald v. Miller Jr. 

A primer on the litigation trajectory and defense strategy can be found here. In short, rather than proving a lack of causation on a case-by-case basis (i.e., that Roundup doesn’t cause cancer, the prevailing scientific view embraced by most scientists, governmental agencies, and public health departments around the world), Bayer/Monsanto presented its conundrum to the Supreme Court on legal grounds. They argued that the warning sought by plaintiffs was not only scientifically flawed but also illegal under the statute governing pesticide regulation, the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA). 

The Case Behind the Ruling

The case concerns John Durnell, who brought a “failure-to-warn suit” under state common law against Monsanto for failing to include a cancer warning on Roundup’s label, which he claims caused his non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL). Durnell’s lawyers relied on a “problematic” report from IARC, a World Health Organization agency, which classified Roundup’s active ingredient, glyphosate, as a “probable carcinogen.”

Borrowing from similar legislation governing drugs and medical device regulation [1], which preempts certain lawsuits brought under state common-law tort claims, Monsanto/Bayer claimed that compliance with FIFRA preempts state court failure-to-warn cases, thereby preventing the addition of the sought-after warning, and noted that the EPA and most international health agencies dispute the IARC report. 

Why the Label Could Not Simply Be Changed

Seven of the Supremes agreed. Their reasoning was multifaceted. 

• The Act requires that all pesticides be registered with the EPA. To do so, the EPA must approve the pesticide’s label, determining that it contains all warnings “necessary and… adequate to protect health and the environment…” and does not include false or misleading statements. After the EPA approves the label, manufacturers are legally required to use it as is. Any changes (including adding the warning the plaintiffs demanded) would be illegal, and the manufacturer might face liability for misbranding. 
• FIFRA defines “protect health and the environment” to mean “protection against any unreasonable adverse effects on the environment,” including “any unreasonable risk to man or the environment, taking into account the economic, social, and environmental costs and benefits of the use of any pesticide.” [2]
• The statute’s purpose is to promote uniformity by conferring on the EPA comprehensive and exclusive authority to register pesticides and approve labels. Allowing each state to impose its own warning requirements would frustrate this objective and thus preempts state failure-to-warn claims because “FIFRA prohibits states from imposing any requirements for labeling or packaging in addition to or different from those required under FIFRA.”

As a result, this requirement prevents the placement of the warning that the plaintiff sought. The majority ruled that “as a matter of federal law, Monsanto must use a label without a cancer warning unless and until the EPA approves or requires a change.”

The EPA’s Role Was the Point, Not the Problem

The court painstakingly noted the extensive review and evaluation the EPA conducts before approving labels, both generally and for Roundup, to ensure that labels do not omit a necessary warning. The court also noted the “slew of tools” the EPA possesses to monitor subsequent scientific developments and determine whether and when to require additional warnings, including the power to suspend or cancel registration “to prevent an imminent hazard.”

Moreover, the opinion recounts the EPA’s history of evaluating glyphosate-based pesticides, beginning in 1974, when it first approved a label without a cancer warning. Again in 1991 and repeatedly in the more than three decades since, we learn that the EPA has “repeatedly re-evaluated glyphosate and has repeatedly concluded that glyphosate is not likely to cause cancer.” Even following the IARC classification of glyphosate as a probable carcinogen in 2017 and 2019, the EPA re-evaluated the issue “but still adhered to its longstanding position on glyphosate,” and reiterated its position in a 2020 interim registration review. Noting that “EPA’s assessment is shared by many other regulatory bodies around the world that have likewise concluded that glyphosate is not carcinogenic…,” the majority ruled that “as a matter of federal law, Monsanto legally must use a label without a cancer warning unless and until EPA approves or requires a change.”

The Dissent’s Unlikely Duo 

Writing that the majority relied on a medical device case under FDA law and disregarded a Supreme Court precedent on FIFRA, the dissent vigorously objects to the decision. Authored by the ultra-liberal Justice Ketanji Jackson and joined by arch-conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch, the dissent reads, to me, like an apology to the plaintiffs’ bar.

Justice Jackson laments that the decision deprives Mr. Durnell of a remedy for his claim. One wonders whether Justice Jackson forgot first-year law school, where students learn that remedies are available only to address wrongs. Since the majority clearly ruled that no wrong was committed, no remedy exists. 

Next, Justice Jackson proposes a solution for the conundrum faced by Bayer/Monsanto. Given they could not augment the label with a cancer warning without running afoul of federal law, she asserts the company could have chosen not to market the product at all. 

Uniform Labels, Uniform Markets

The dissent’s two-dimensionality also fails to account for the policy rationale behind the legislation. FIFRA specifically emphasizes the importance of uniform rulings, a clearly business-based rationale. Different requirements across states create commercial obstacles and uncertainties that would frustrate business development and insurance planning, which underlie the uniformity requirement.

The EPA is charged not only with balancing product development with human health and environmental safety, but also with the product's overall economics. This additional consideration requires the agency to weigh the agricultural, nutritional, and environmental risks and benefits of glyphosate pesticides, which enable greater cultivation and food production at lower cost.

Further, not only did the majority rule that Monsanto/Bayer had no alternative but to comply with FIFRA’s directive and omit a warning, but they also relied on the EPA’s determination that causality between the product and cancer is unproven and likely doesn’t exist, meaning a warning wasn’t necessary under any decision-making standard. 

Hand Wringing over Chevron’s Demise

Many moons ago, much was written, tears were shed, and worry was wasted when the Supreme Court overruled the Chevron case, which held that deference was due to agencies making technical or scientific decisions, thereby vesting those decisions in judges without proper expertise or training. The fear was that we would have wacky judicial decisions on scientific matters.

Under the Loper Bright decision, which overturned Chevron, the court was free to re-evaluate for itself the scientific basis behind EPA’s decision, i.e., that glyphosate was not a likely human carcinogen, and no cancer warning was needed. They didn’t. Indeed, they proudly touted EPA expertise and diligence in rendering its ruling.

The decision is more than a victory for Monsanto. It reaffirms that federal statutory decisions grounded in science cannot be circumvented by artful lawyers invoking favored-state tort law and junk science. It appears that the Roundup litigation boom and the thousands of similar claims that have sprung up may finally have met their weed killer.

 

[1] The FDA’s Medical Device Amendment of 1976 is nearly identical to FIFRA’s preemption clause. 

[2] While changes are permitted to account for new information, any changes must be approved prior to their inclusion.

https://www.acsh.org/news/2026/06/30/cabashing-roundup-litigation-50207