False-negative SARS-CoV-2 test results can negatively impact the clinical and public health response to COVID-19. We used droplet digital PCR (ddPCR) to demonstrate that human DNA levels, a stable molecular marker of sampling quality, were significantly lower in samples from 40 confirmed or suspected COVID-19 cases that yielded negative diagnostic test results (i.e. suspected false-negative test results) compared to a representative pool of 87 specimens submitted for COVID-19 testing. Our results support suboptimal biological sampling as a contributor to false-negative COVID-19 test results and underscore the importance of proper training and technique in the collection of nasopharyngeal specimens.

中文翻译：

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次佳的生物采样可能是假阴性COVID-19诊断测试结果的可能原因。

假阴性的SARS-CoV-2检测结果可能会对COVID-19的临床和公共卫生反应产生负面影响。我们使用液滴数字PCR（ddPCR）证明人类DNA水平，取样质量的稳定的分子标记物，在样品显著降低从40确诊或疑似COVID-19案件产生阴性诊断测试结果（即疑似假阴性测试结果）与提交COVID-19测试的87个样本的代表性库进行比较。我们的研究结果支持了次佳的生物采样，从而有助于假阴性的COVID-19测试结果，并强调了在鼻咽标本采集中进行适当培训和技术的重要性。