The CDC announced Thursday that the organization is currently investigating how one of its laboratory workers could have become infected with Salmonella while conducting lab work involving the pathogen strain.
The worker had completed all required safety training prior to the potential incidence of infection. The laboratory worker was reportedly following standard protocols while performing a basic procedure on a frozen sample of the bacteria. The agency is investigating to determine whether added safety measures are needed to prevent future exposures.
The employee is reportedly well and back at the CDC. Based on the current information available, no other staff were exposed to the pathogen.
Lab safety has been a priority for the CDC of late. The agency even named lab safety as one if its six public health threats to focus on this year. In 2015, the CDC established the Office of the Associate Director for Laboratory Science and Safety and added the first class of lab leadership fellows.
These changes stemmed from lab safety issues that came to light in 2014, including the mishandling of anthrax and bird flu samples and the exposure of a lab tech to live Ebola virus in a CDC lab.
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