Another 995 people were told were incorrectly told they were negative for Covid on Christmas – after 400 were given incorrect results the day before
A further 995 patients have been incorrectly told they were Covid-negative in a monumental blunder by one of Sydney’s leading hospitals.
The Sydney Pathology testing centre at St Vincent’s Hospital in Darlinghurst wrongly told 1,395 people they didn’t have Covid and were free to spend Christmas Day with their loved ones.
On Boxing Day, they issued a formal apology to 400 patients, warning them ‘human error’ had contributed to the wrong advice and they were, in fact, infected with Covid.
By Monday, that number had been amended to 1,395 wrong pathology results.
Those impacted have already been contacted by hospital officials. It’s understood text messages confirming a negative result were wrongly sent to each of the patients before their samples had even undergone testing.
Pictured: A man has a swab taken at a drive-through COVID-19 testing clinic at Bondi Beach in Sydney on December 21 as the city experiences an unprecedented demand
An Easter suburbs musician was one of more than 400 people who received a text message giving the all clear for Christmas (left) before receiving another message the following day informing they were actually positive (right)
A spokesperson for St Vincent’s Hospital has since assured the public such a monumental human error will not happen again.
A musician from Sydney’s east who was among the 400 initially identified as having received a botched result indicated he’d be taking legal action.
He’d been self isolating after several rapid antigen tests he took indicated he was Covid-positive, but joined his family on Christmas Day, assured by his negative result.
But the following morning, after attending a big Christmas dinner that he rearranged after getting the good news, he received another message informing him of the ‘laboratory error’ – and that he was in fact positive.
He is now furious that he could have spread the highly-transmissible Omicron variant to his partner and closest friends because of someone else’s stuff up.
Members of the public queue for Covid tests at a clinic at Bondi Beach in Sydney on Sunday – with many experiencing four day waits for results
Hundreds of other families are likely to be in the same position, with the false negative test result coming through on Christmas Day – just in time to rearrange lunch plans.
‘This means I could have infected my partner, our friends and any casual contact due to negligence from the lab,’ he said.
‘I am planning on taking legal action for this, it is unacceptable to play with people’s lives like this.
‘I would rather prefer to wait a week for the right result rather than getting a ‘quick’ (+72 hrs later) result done in a rush.’
St Vincent’s and SydPath also run the drive-through clinic at Bondi Beach, which had queues for up to three hours in the days leading to Christmas.
Premier Dominic Perrottet is urging Sydneysiders not to get tested unless they’re displaying symptoms or have been directed to test in an attempt to alleviate the pressures on clinics throughout the state.
People are reporting 100-hour waits to receive their results and are even being turned away from clinics due to the delays.
A man who was told he was negative and then attending a Christmas dinner is considering taking legal action
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