Man tests positive and negative for COVID-19 within four hours

A man in Georgia’s Cobb County has been left utterly mystified and unsure of his health status after testing positive and negative for the deadly novel coronavirus within four hours. 

Shaun Smith tested positive for the Coronavirus at 8 am on Saturday at Piedmont Hospital, then followed up with a second test just to be sure and that was when the confusion began to set in. He tested negative.

“That blew my mind all the way up,” Smith told  Fox 5 Atlanta. “It’s crazy to me that we have all of these tests that could be giving out false negatives or positives. And people don’t even know and they’re just running with it,” he added.

Smith, before taking the confirmatory test which came out positive and negative in just four hours apart, had 10 days earlier tested negative for the virus which has so far infected more than one million people across the United States with 74,581 deaths.

The uncertainty of his health status has now forced him to cancel a planned surgery he was to have on Monday. “Every three to four weeks I get really sick, start vomiting and I end up in the hospital. So now I have to wait three weeks to find out when I can get surgery again,” Smith said. 

Despite his negative test, Smith said he now feels some coronavirus symptoms and that the test might be a false negative. But he would have to wait for 21 days to be retested by Piedmont.

“These different groups that should know the information and should be giving me the information, they don’t know and they’re not giving me the information,” Smith said. “Just keep us safe. The tests are not accurate. Make sure we can have accurate tests.”

With 30,671 confirmed cases of the coronavirus and 1,305 deaths recorded in Georgia, Gov. Brian Kemp started reopening nonessential businesses, despite warnings by experts that the move will push the rate at which people will contract the disease in the coming weeks.

“By taking this measured action, we will get Georgians back to work safely without undermining the progress that we have all made in the battle against COVID-19,” the governor said on April 20.