Australia's Sydney hospital sends 400 incorrect COVID negative results

Amid the rising cases of the Omicron variant of COVID-19, a major "human error" case has been reported at St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney. As many as 400 COVID-positive patients were wrongly told that their PCR test results were negative on Christmas night. 

On Sunday afternoon, SydPath Medical Director Professor Anthony Dodds said in a statement, "Last night we incorrectly messaged 400 patients who had been swabbed at our centers from December 22 to 23, advising them they had tested negative for COVID-19," reported The Sydney Morning Herald.

Dodds further explained that these people had actually tested positive, and it was only the next day's morning that the doctors. realised that they had been given COVID negative results due to 'human error'. The hospital immediately contacted the people and revealed that their test reports were actually positive and asked them to stay in isolation. "An emergency response team is now investigating the cause of this mistake, which is believed to be a human error, according to the statement issued by the hospital. "We sincerely apologise to all those impacted," it read.

The reports were of the test, which was taken on Wednesday and Thursday. The hospital released the statement hours after the NSW premier and health minister warned about the impact of "tourist testing" that was causing massive backlogs for test clinics. Hospitals and private testing labs across the state are overwhelmed due to excess demand with an average of around 1,45,000 tests a day over the past week. Meanwhile, NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard on Sunday urged citizens to get vaccinated as Omicron cases are rising rapidly and vaccination can protect everyone's health. 

COVID situation in Australia

COVID cases in Australia are on the rise. New South Wales recorded a total of 6,394 new infection cases. Victoria reported 2,108 new infection cases followed by six deaths, whereas Queensland announced 765 COVID cases in the last 24 hours. In South Australia, 634 new COVID cases were recorded, and Tasmania reported a total of 33 new infection cases in the last 24 hours. The number of COVID cases has gone up in the last two weeks, and over 70% of cases in some states of Australia are the Omicron variant, which is rapidly sweeping the world. 

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