(2014-07-17) — On the heels of recent discoveries of small pox, influenza and dengue virus, apparently misplaced for decades in a government lab cooler, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) today revealed it found a crate of 144 vials of a contagion lost for so long many thought it mythical.

Scientists at the Centers for Disease Control admitted yet another discovery of lost infectious specimens — a gross of cooties.

“We discovered a gross of cooties,” a CDC spokesman said, “which, as any school child knows is spread almost instantaneously by human contact — primarily between a juvenile carrier and a subject of the opposite sex. We’re fairly sure we avoided exposing our staff at the lab, but all it takes is a touch.”

Officially, the CDC urged the public to “remain calm,” but during a media tour of the Atlanta laboratory, journalists saw several scientists and technicians rubbing spots on their arms where associates had inadvertently touched them. A spokesman assured reporters that the wiping motion was strictly a precautionary measure.

Federal health officials said they’re so cautious, they refused to make a video warning the public of the dangers of mishandled specimens for fear that it woud “go viral” on YouTube.