Causes and countermeasures of false-negative results for 2019 novel coronavirus nucleic acid test

Abstract

In December 2019, a cluster of patients with pneumonia of unknown cause were linked to a seafood wholesale market in Wuhan, China. Some studies found that the virus was a new kind of virus which had never been found in the human body. Then, the virus was named 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) by the World Health Organization (WHO). 2019-nCoV nucleic acid detection is one of the essential indicators of COVID-19. Recently, some false-negative cases in China-Japan Friendship Hospital and Hangzhou Hospital led the clinical doctors to question the value of the nucleic acid detection. In this paper, more than 3 000 results of 2019-nCoV detection in Zhongnan Hospital, Wuhan University were analyzed. Attention should be paid to the root cause of false-negative results and the related countermeasures should be taken. Key words: Coronavirus; Nucleic acids; Polymerase chain reaction; False negative reactions; Quality control