The Health Ministry announced that it would be halting coronavirus testing that was being done at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, after 51 residents in two different nursing homes falsely tested positive for the virus on Friday, Kan News reported. On Friday evening, 29 elderly patients tested negative for the coronavirus at their respective hospitals after previously testing positive at their geriatric facility.
Suspicions arose after the 29 from Zehavit nursing home in Ashkelon tested positive on Thursday night, but failed to show symptoms.
Earlier on Friday, 22 residents at the Beit Hadar Ashdod geriatric center also tested positive for coronavirus.
A spokesperson for the Institute told Kan that the lab followed the Health Ministry’s protocols, and blamed the false positives on guidelines specifying that borderline test results be determined positive. “The Weizmann Institute of Science has made available to the Ministry of Health an advanced laboratory, which operates under the sole supervision and responsibility of the Health Ministry. According to clear guidelines from the Health Ministry, tests that are borderline – as they were in these cases – are determined to be positive.” A spokesman for the Health Ministry addressed the issue, saying they will be retesting samples which were tested at the institute, adding that: “We suspect there is a problem in one of the stages of the laboratory diagnostic process. The issue is currently undergoing a thorough investigation. Repeat examinations of additional patients and caregivers will be made as needed.” On the state of the falsely diagnosed patients, he said that “respiratory patients who have been transferred to the hospitals are now in isolation, and the appropriate place for continued hospitalization is being examined so that they do not become infected in the event that some are not sick.”
An official source called the mistaken test results a “scandal,” according to Kan. “Intubated geriatric patients were moved from a set place to a hospital and exposed to bacteria and possibly also to the coronavirus,” said the official. Jerusalem Post staff contributed to this article.
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