CDC and hospital errors led to US coronavirus patient being sent back to military base, health official says

Errors by a hospital in San Diego and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention led to a woman with the novel coronavirus being sent back to Marine Corps Air Station Miramar instead of isolation at the hospital, according to a health official familiar with the situation.

American evacuees from Wuhan toss face masks in the air as they end their 14-day coronavirus quarantine at March Air Reserve Base near Riverside, California. (Photo/Riverside County Public Health)

Related article The 1st group of Americans evacuated because of coronavirus to be released Tuesday

The woman was among Americans in federal quarantine at the base, and is the first US evacuee from China known to be infected with the novel coronavirus.

She flew to the base on February 5 on a US Department of State flight evacuating Americans from Wuhan, China. The next day, she started experiencing symptoms of the novel coronavirus and was taken to UC San Diego Health. Three other people exhibiting symptoms were also transported to the hospital.

The hospital sent their specimens to a CDC lab in Atlanta for testing. According to the source, three of the four specimens were incorrectly labeled upon arrival and so they were not tested. The CDC lab did not realize the specimens were from the Miramar patients.

WUHAN, Feb. 10, 2020 -- Medical staff discuss at a temporary hospital converted from "Wuhan Livingroom" in Wuhan, central China's Hubei Province, Feb. 10, 2020. In face of the outbreak of the novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic, Wuhan authorities have transformed public venues such as exhibition centers and gymnasiums into temporary hospitals. The hospitals have a large capacity of treating patients with mild symptoms and play an important role in isolating the source of infection and cutting off the routes of infection during epidemic prevention. The first batch of patients was hospitalized on Feb. 5. (Photo by Xiong Qi/Xinhua via Getty) (Xinhua/Xiong Qi via Getty Images)

Related article Coronavirus death toll surpasses 1,000 in mainland China

When no results were reported back, CDC staffers mistakenly gave UC San Diego Health the results of other patients who tested negative. That mistake led to the Miramar patients being transferred back to the base Sunday afternoon.

After they arrived back at the base, the mistake was discovered and the tests were run on the three Miramar patients.

The results for the woman came back positive, and she was transported back to UC San Diego Health on Monday morning, where she remains in isolation. The woman has had a very mild illness, according to the source, with no fever and a slight cough.

The other three patients tested negative.

A spokesperson for the hospital could not be immediately reached for comment about the testing issues.

In a response Tuesday, the CDC said: “At all times, appropriate infection control precautions were taken around all of the persons quarantined at Miramar, including these three patients. From now on, a CDC laboratory staff member will form part of CDC quarantine field teams to ensure that specimens are correctly labeled/CLIA compliant to avoid delays in testing.”

During a press conference on Tuesday, Dr. Anne Schuchat, principal deputy director of the CDC, said “there was a little bit of a mix-up there” around the testing for the Miramar patient, but would not elaborate.

Schuchat said the confirmed Miramar case may have had limited contact with other people when symptoms developed, but the investigation into contacts is ongoing.

The patient was wearing a mask while she was transported to and from the hospital, and the driver wore protection equipment, according to the health official familiar with the situation.

Separately, another person at Miramar was hospitalized on Monday afternoon and was being tested for the coronavirus.

Both patients “are doing well and have minimal symptoms,” UC San Diego Health said.

The San Diego case is the 13th to be confirmed in the US and the seventh in California. Eleven of the US cases were confirmed in people who recently traveled to China; the other two are instances of person-to-person transmission.

This story has been updated to incorporate new information from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.