St Vincent’s Hospital apologises after 400 sent Covid text wrongly telling them they are negative

A Sydney hospital has apologised after 400 Covid cases were wrongly sent a text telling them they were negative when they actually returned a positive result.

Hundreds of people have wrongly been sent a text message telling them they are Covid negative, when they are positive.

St Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney issued an apology on Boxing Day, saying the situation was believed to have been caused by human error.

“SydPath last night incorrectly messaged more than 400 people, advising them they had tested negative to Covid,” the hospital said in a statement on Sunday.

“These people had tested positive to Covid.

St Vincent's Hospital in Sydney said it became aware of the issue on Sunday morning.

“As soon as we became aware of the issue this morning, SydPath immediately commenced a process to contact impacted people.”

The hospital said an emergency response team was now investigating the cause of this mistake, which is believed to have been human error.

“We sincerely apologise to all those impacted,” the hospital continued.

It comes as NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard warned “we’re all going to get Omicron”, as cases in the state hit a new high of 6934 infections.

It follows the state’s previous record of 6288 infections on Christmas Day, up from 5612 on Friday.

Mr Hazzard on Sunday urged people to get vaccinated and warned everyone would come into contact with the Omicron variant.

“Bottom line here is that we would expect that pretty well everybody in NSW at some point will get Omicron,” he said.

“And if we’re all going to get Omicron, the best way to face it is when we have full vaccination including our booster.“The challenge for us in the state is to make sure that our health system can cope.”

Cases in NSW have hit a new high of 6934 infections. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Bianca De Marchi

There have been no new Covid-related deaths, but the latest figures released on Boxing Day have revealed there are 458 people in hospital with the virus, with 52 of those in intensive care.

The number of hospitalisations – which is the way NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet says the virus risk should be measured – is an increase of 70 people from the data released on Christmas Day when there were 388 in hospital.

However the number of people in ICU has remained the same.

“It’s very clear from ICU presentations that the majority of people who are in ICU are unvaccinated,” Mr Perrottet said.

The state also hit its first dose vaccination goal of 95 per cent coverage on Saturday.

In the ACT, 71 new cases were reported on Boxing Day, around half of the cases reported a day earlier.

Originally published as St Vincent’s Hospital apologises after 400 sent Covid text wrongly telling them they are negative