Summary

GAO reviewed the extent to which the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) should be recovering the costs of diagnostic laboratory services provided to non-federal organizations and federal agencies. The review focused on certain CDC laboratory services that GAO believed had provided special benefits to the clinical laboratory industry and on similar services provided to other federal agencies.

CDC should recover substantial amounts of incurred costs by imposing additional user charges for various diagnostic laboratory services that it provides to federal agencies and non-federal organizations such as diagnostic product manufacturers and clinical laboratories. These laboratory services include field testing of diagnostic products, evaluating lot samples of diagnostic reagents, providing reference reagents to manufacturers, evaluating the quality of diagnostic testing services provided by laboratories, and providing laboratory training services. GAO estimated that, under current legislative authority, CDC could have collected about $2.1 million in additional revenues from non-federal entities in fiscal year 1982. If CDC had not been restricted by another statute which imposes a maximum fee on interstate laboratories, an additional estimated $650,000 could have been recovered. Further, CDC could have sought additional reimbursements from other federal agencies for which it provided some of these services.