A bizarre accident in a Georgia animal laboratory that seemed unlikely to occur by ordinary laws of chance has killed a 22-year-old lab assistant exposed to a herpes virus in a rhesus monkey.

Elizabeth R. Griffin, a worker at Yerkes Primate Research Center at Emory University in Atlanta, became the first known human to have contracted herpes B virus via the eye.

Carried only by macaque monkeys, which include rhesus monkeys, herpes B is relatively harmless to the monkeys and is difficult for them to transmit to other animals. In the United States, the virus has been transmitted to humans only 40 times in the last 64 years, but it has been fatal in 70 percent of those cases.

Griffin, who recently graduated from college, died Wednesday in Atlanta after a six-week, up-and-down struggle against the disease.

Viral researchers said her death should serve as a warning to be aware of risks when people handle monkeys of the macaque species, especially people who have them as pets.

"People who keep them as pets are distressingly ignorant," said Dr. Louisa Chapman, an epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

"We are always getting calls from physicians treating patients, especially children, bitten by pet monkeys. Fortunately, even with bites and scratches, few of them become infected."

There is no way of determining how many macaques are kept as pets. Thousands of the monkeys, however, are used in medical research--especially rhesus monkeys. They are favored because they are plentiful and breed easily in captivity.

Griffin was unknowingly exposed to the virus as she helped move a cage containing a rhesus monkey at the Yerkes lab.

The lab, which uses primates in research on such human diseases as AIDS and cancer orders employees to follow strict safety protocols when working with animals. Griffin was following those protocols, wearing a facial mask, clothing and gloves to protect her from bites and scratches, when the accident occurred.

As she helped move the cage, covered with a fine-mesh screen as a further precaution, Griffin peeked into the cage to see how the monkey was faring. The monkey apparently either spit or flung bodily fluid at her as she peered in, striking her eyeball.

"Because it was so minor an event, it was not even viewed by (Griffin) as serious," said Dr. Tom Gordon, a Yerkes spokesman.

"She didn't even see it as an accident or an injury."

Another Yerkes spokeswoman, Kate Egan, said that because the virus isn't known to travel through the air, Griffin didn't believe she had endangered herself by not wearing eye protection.

"In every other case we know of, the infection is from a bite or a scratch or a needle stick," Egan said.

About 10 days after the accident, Griffin's eye became inflamed and she was admitted to a hospital, where she responded well to anti-viral medication. Sent home after 10 days, she returned after complaining of weakness in her legs. She died this week in the hospital.

Herpes B was first isolated and described by famed polio researcher Dr. Albert Sabin, who eventually developed a live polio vaccine by growing them on rhesus monkey cells.

There are a large number of herpes viruses that occur primarily in monkeys. Because the monkeys are the natural hosts to the viruses, they are relatively benign, much as human versions of herpes are relatively benign in humans, occasionally causing lesions and skin eruptions when the carrier is stressed or ill.

Researchers say that in macaques the virus is active and transmissible only 2 percent to 3 percent of the time. Even when the virus is active and a monkey bites or scratches a human, the virus rarely is transmitted. But when it is transmitted to a human, it takes a devastating course.

"It attacks the central nervous system and causes severe neurological damage," said Dr. Patricia Spear, chairwoman of microbiology and immunology at Northwestern University.

Macaque monkeys in general and rhesus monkeys in particular are not endangered, so most zoos do not keep or display them. Neither Lincoln Park Zoo nor Brookfield Zoo has had any macaques for more than a decade.

In zoos, they pose no risk to visitors because they are either displayed behind glass walls or far from any possible public contact.

Safety protocols have reduced chances of transmission of the virus over the years. Griffin's death probably will make those protocols even more stringent.