The Health Minister, Dr Jane Ruth Aceng on Saturday said nine negative cases that had erroneously been recorded as positive have been discounted from the national tally, bringing the country's confirmed cases down to 685, contrary to what was earlier reported.

The minister explained that between June 3 and 4, a batch of 50 samples from within Kampala area was analysed in Makerere University Laboratory and yielded results that were detected as positive.

According to the minister, errors in handling test samples is not uncommon in laboratory management.

Some of the factors that may cause errors in test results, according to the minister, include limitation of the test itself and processing errors.

"Errors leading to false results can be classified into; errors before analysis (pre-analytic) which may arise during sample collection, packaging, shipping, opening, etc.