Coronavirus: Noguchi rejects 800 contaminated samples

Information on COVID-19 on the official Ghana Health Service (GHS) indicates that the service is continuing with the supervision of the completion of the backlog of laboratory samples which have been picked for testing for COVID-19.

However, information from the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research (NMIMR) points to the fact that results from some of these samples can never be declared because “they were already contaminated” upon arrival at the facility.

Senior Research Fellow and member of the COVID-19 testing team at the Noguchi NMIMR, Dr. Kofi Bonney, made this disclosure on the Happy Morning Show hosted by Samuel Eshun on Happy98.9FM.

“We had to reject over 800 samples because they were not processed or packaged well. By the time they arrived at the facility, these samples were already contaminated with tube contents mixed up because the institution bringing them were not diligent enough”, he disclosed.

Dr. Bonney noted that when such mishandling happens, it is impossible for tests to be conducted because contents from tube A could have found its way into another tube rendering all samples useless.

According to him, some of these institutions responsible for transporting COVID-19 samples take things for granted and that is a very bad and risky thing to do by a health outfit. “The institution which I can’t mention by name transported this batch in a polythene bag” causing the avoidable accident. He noted that incidents like these and others add up to what is referred to us a “backlog”.

The Doctor also added, samples with mismatching forms and containers are also rejected because the accuracy in tracing positive results will flawed from the get go.

There is currently a debate ongoing in the country which suggests that the government is managing cases of COVID-19 positives and not being truthful with actual number of infected persons.