{"id":16209,"date":"2020-04-23T07:56:28","date_gmt":"2020-04-23T02:56:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/2020\/04\/coronavirus-%e2%80%8bthree-negatives-and-a-positive-problems-with-coronavirus-tests-in-china\/"},"modified":"2020-04-23T07:56:28","modified_gmt":"2020-04-23T02:56:28","slug":"coronavirus-three-negatives-and-a-positive-problems-with-coronavirus-tests-in-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/2020\/04\/23\/coronavirus-three-negatives-and-a-positive-problems-with-coronavirus-tests-in-china\/","title":{"rendered":"coronavirus: \u200bThree negatives and a positive: problems with coronavirus tests in China"},"content":{"rendered":"
WUHAN, CHINA: Trader He Ximing in the Chinese city of Wuhan says he has no idea how or where he captured the coronavirus or why repeated nucleic acid tests showed he did not have it.
Doctors told him he was not a coronavirus patient, despite having had difficulty breathing with what he described as suffocating chest congestion since early February.
But his condition worried the authorities enough to send him to a quarantine center.
Still, he did not challenge all three negative tests at the time. After all, his wife did not get sick.
But she was unable to rid herself of the lingering suspicion that she had the coronavirus, and in late March she went to a hospital in Wuhan for further tests, including one to detect antibodies.
This time it tested positive.
"I wasn't expecting it," the 52-year-old vegetable vendor said when he showed Reuters a copy of his test results, positive for antibodies showing exposure to the coronavirus.
Finally, at least, he had an explanation for why he felt so terrible. "I felt like I was dying. You can't imagine how it feels."
His case is not unique. Similar instances in China and elsewhere have exacerbated concerns about the accuracy of coronavirus tests, even as authorities push for tests to be key to managing the crisis.
Unreliable evidence could undermine strategies not only to stop the virus but also to open up blocked economies, as pressure grows on governments around the world to ease restrictions.
More than 2.5 million people have been infected with the coronavirus globally, and about 177,000 have died, according to a Reuters count.
Wuhan, where the new coronavirus emerged late last year, recorded 50,333 cases and 3,869 deaths as of April 21, accounting for the majority of China's cases.
Nucleic acid testing, in samples taken from the back of a patient's throat or respiratory tract, to detect the virus genome, is the primary way to detect cases.
The test is not easy to administer and, according to experts, errors occur, such as if a sample is taken too small or if the swab does not detect a spot affected by the virus.
"The limitations of these tests need to be recognized, and the need for regular testing if we want to make sure that someone is really negative and that they stay that way for a period of time," said Andrew Preston, professor of microbial pathogenesis at The University of Bath.
TEST TIMES
There is little consensus on what proportion of nucleic acid tests produce false negatives.
A survey by Chinese doctors in February that analyzed samples from 213 patients suggested a false-negative rate of about 30%.
The media also reported cases of people repeatedly testing negative before finally obtaining a positive result.
In February, the People's Daily newspaper reported on a woman who had fallen ill with pneumonia but failed the coronavirus test four times. A fifth test was positive.
Wuhan authorities have begun testing residents for antibodies. China is conducting an epidemiological survey in nine regions in an effort to determine the full extent of asymptomatic infections and immunity levels.
He said he was first tested on March 1 when his chest congestion worsened even though he had no fever or cough.
X-rays showed that his lungs had white spots, similar to those found in patients with coronavirus, but his nucleic acid test was not positive, which is why a hospital refused to admit it.
As a precaution, a committee that manages his housing complex quarantined him for 14 days.
Later, two more hospital tests came back negative, so he turned to traditional Chinese medicine and other drugs.
Finally, on March 28, she took a fourth nucleic acid test, which was negative again, but she was also tested for antibodies and confirmed.
"I told my story to a doctor and he said, 'You're so lucky you didn't die,'" he said in his apartment, where boxes of various medications were scattered.
His wife, with whom he lives alone, has shown no symptoms of coronavirus although she has not been examined.
He said he believed he was immune and non-infectious, though he doesn't take chances and wear an N95 mask and face mask when he goes out.
"If there is a chance of infecting others, I will harm them," he said. "So I am taking these precautions." <\/div>\n

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WUHAN, CHINA: Trader He Ximing in the Chinese city of Wuhan says he has no idea how or where he captured the coronavirus or why repeated nucleic acid tests showed he did not have it. Doctors told him he was not a coronavirus patient, despite having had difficulty breathing with what he described as suffocating […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[19083,21964,22825,23542],"class_list":["post-16209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","tag-coronavirus","tag-quarantine","tag-tests","tag-wuhan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16209"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16209\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}