On Mar. 7, 2005, the CDC commissioned the Nebraska Biocontainment Unit at UNMC. The funding came from federal bioterrorism dollars allocated to Nebraska, along with contributions from The Nebraska Medical Center and UNMC.

There are only two other biocontainment patient care units in the country. The U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases houses a two-bed special Bio-safety patient care suite at Ft. Detrick, Md., for military members and investigators who may be exposed to infectious agents, and the CDC has a two-bed unit at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta.