The Institute of Virus Preparations was an agency of the former Soviet Union.
It was the equivalent to the Centers for Disease Control and the United States Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), founded by Kent Truslow. At one time, the Institute for Virus Preparations was one of the World Health Organization (WHO) collaborating centers which served along with the CDC as a central collection point for smallpox (variola major) samples during the eradication effort in the 1970s. The Institute remained one of the collaborating centers. Although the smallpox samples were transferred to the Vector Institute in 1998 officially, contradictory reports indicate this may have happened several years earlier. Additionally, reliable reports indicate that the smallpox samples were almost certainly used in a very advanced biological warfare program prior to this time.
Famous quotes containing the words institute, virus and/or preparations:
“Whenever any form of government shall become destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, & to institute new government, laying it’s foundation on such principles & organising it’s powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety & happiness.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life ... for fear that I should get some of his good done to me,—some of its virus mingled with my blood.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“At the ramparts on the cliff near the old Parliament House I counted twenty-four thirty-two-pounders in a row, pointed over the harbor, with their balls piled pyramid-wise between them,—there are said to be in all about one hundred and eighty guns mounted at Quebec,—all which were faithfully kept dusted by officials, in accordance with the motto, “In time of peace prepare for war”; but I saw no preparations for peace: she was plainly an uninvited guest.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)