ABSTRACT
Coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) has non-specific clinical and laboratory characteristics that might be similar to other viral infection including dengue. Two Covid-19 cases with 'false-positive' dengue serology have been reported in Singapore but no public health consequence was described. We describe a Thai patient with an initial diagnosis of dengue fever who was later confirmed to also infect with SARSCoV-2. The Covid-19 infection appeared to spread to one family member and one healthcare worker.
ABSTRACT
We report a 35-year-old female nurse who possibly received the SARS-CoV-2 virus during the blood sampling of a 35-year-old male patient initially suspected as a dengue infection. The patient had mild thrombocytopenia and positive dengue IgG and IgM whereas the clinicians were not aware of the possibility of false-positive dengue serology revealed in the published case report from Singapore. The nurse put on a pair of gloves but did not wear a mask during the only encounter with this patient. This nosocomial transmission raised a safety concern among healthcare professionals in an area with a relatively low Covid-19 prevalence, especially when the clinical and laboratory characteristics could be confused with other viral infections.