A suspected case of COVID-19 turned into a confirmed case: a case report

COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) is an infectious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and discovered in 2019. The clinical manifestations include fever, coughing, difficulty in breathing and even death from multiple organ failure. Nucleic acid test is the golden standard method for confirmation of infection. According to the Chinese ‘Seventh Edition of the COVID-19 Diagnosis and Treatment Protocol’, suspected patients with negative nucleic acid tests from two consecutive airway specimens can be excluded from diagnosis and released from quarantine. The current report describes a suspected COVID-19 case that had a history of close contact with a COVID-19 patient. The diagnosis was confirmed after the SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid was detected after four sputum sample tests (sampling interval of at least 24 h).