Ebola only the la tét dificulty for the CDC

It's been a rough year for the CDC.

First, in the spring, the agency mishandled samples of a highly pathogenic strain of avian influenza.

In that incident, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Southeast Poultry Research Laboratory asked the CDC for a sample of the low-pathogenicity H9N2 virus, but instead found the dangerous H5N1 virus in the sample it received. The agency investigated and found that a scientist -- who was not named by the agency -- did not follow proper procedures when he or she inoculated each virus into canine kidney cells.

Then, in June, 84 CDC staff members in Atlanta were inadvertently exposed to anthrax due to a breakdown in safety procedures. In that mishap, which the CDC reported in August, a scientist planning to autoclave and discard samples of anthrax bacteria couldn't open the autoclave door and instead returned the samples to an incubator; another researcher noticed growth on the samples a week later, kicking off an investigation.

Now, of course, the CDC is dealing with a case of Ebola in Dallas and the public's concerns about the spread of that virus; the agency has generally gotten good marks for its actions in what is, nonetheless, likely a stressful situation for CDC officials. (On the other hand, the Dallas case has, in the view of manyMedPage Today readers, undermined the agency's assurances that imported Ebola cases could be readily managed.)

The CDC is hardly the only federal agency to have come in for heavy scrutiny and criticism lately. Julia Pierson, the director of the Secret Service, resigned Oct. 1 after several White House security breaches were made public. In 2013, Lois Lerner, an official at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) who has since retired, came under fire for the IRS' apparent targeting of certain conservative-leaning political groups for close scrutiny.

The FDA has also had its share of critics for issues such as its handling of opioid medications and for approving many drugs later found to have serious safety problems.

The CDC may want to seek advice from crisis management experts such as the ones MedPage Today spoke with (see our story here). But agency officials will also likely be glad to see 2014 in their rear-view mirror in a few months.