Found in All Human DNA

This was important enough that I wanted to get it out immediately. My research into the NCBI database for nucleotide sequences has lead to a stunning discovery. One of the WHO primer sequences in the PCR test for SARS-CoV-2 is found in all human DNA!

The sequence “CTCCCTTTGTTGTGTTGT” is an 18-character primer sequence found in the WHO coronavirus PCR testing protocol document. The primer sequences are what get amplified by the PCR process in order to be detected and designated a “positive” test result. It just so happens this exact same 18-character sequence, verbatim, is also found on Homo sapiens chromosome 8! As far as I can tell, this means that the WHO test kits should find a positive result in all humans. Can anyone explain this otherwise?

I really cannot overstate the significance of this finding. At minimum, it should have a notable impact on test results.

Homo sapiens chromosome 8, GRCh38.p12 Primary Assembly
Sequence ID: NC_000008.11 Length: 145138636
Range 1: 63648346 to 63648363 is “CTCCCTTTGTTGTGTTGT”

Update: After some effort, I have finally discovered a way to display proof (beyond my screenshots) that human chromosome 8 has this exact same 18-character sequence. Please try the link below. The sequence is shown at the bottom of the page.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nucleotide/NC_000008.11?report=genbank&log$=nuclalign&from=63648346&to=63648363

Homo sapiens chromosome 8, GRCh38.p13 Primary Assembly

NCBI Reference Sequence: NC_000008.11

FASTA Graphics Go to:

LOCUS       NC_000008                 18 bp    DNA     linear   CON 17-AUG-2020
DEFINITION  Homo sapiens chromosome 8, GRCh38.p13 Primary Assembly.
ACCESSION   NC_000008 REGION: 63648346..63648363
VERSION     NC_000008.11
DBLINK      BioProject: PRJNA168
            Assembly: GCF_000001405.39
KEYWORDS    RefSeq.
SOURCE      Homo sapiens (human)
  ORGANISM  Homo sapiens
            Eukaryota; Metazoa; Chordata; Craniata; Vertebrata; Euteleostomi;
            Mammalia; Eutheria; Euarchontoglires; Primates; Haplorrhini;
            Catarrhini; Hominidae; Homo.
REFERENCE   1  (bases 1 to 18)
  AUTHORS   Nusbaum,C., Mikkelsen,T.S., Zody,M.C., Asakawa,S., Taudien,S.,
            Garber,M., Kodira,C.D., Schueler,M.G., Shimizu,A., Whittaker,C.A.,
            Chang,J.L., Cuomo,C.A., Dewar,K., FitzGerald,M.G., Yang,X.,
            Allen,N.R., Anderson,S., Asakawa,T., Blechschmidt,K., Bloom,T.,
            Borowsky,M.L., Butler,J., Cook,A., Corum,B., DeArellano,K.,
            DeCaprio,D., Dooley,K.T., Dorris,L. III, Engels,R., Glockner,G.,
            Hafez,N., Hagopian,D.S., Hall,J.L., Ishikawa,S.K., Jaffe,D.B.,
            Kamat,A., Kudoh,J., Lehmann,R., Lokitsang,T., Macdonald,P.,
            Major,J.E., Matthews,C.D., Mauceli,E., Menzel,U., Mihalev,A.H.,
            Minoshima,S., Murayama,Y., Naylor,J.W., Nicol,R., Nguyen,C.,
            O'Leary,S.B., O'Neill,K., Parker,S.C., Polley,A., Raymond,C.K.,
            Reichwald,K., Rodriguez,J., Sasaki,T., Schilhabel,M., Siddiqui,R.,
            Smith,C.L., Sneddon,T.P., Talamas,J.A., Tenzin,P., Topham,K.,
            Venkataraman,V., Wen,G., Yamazaki,S., Young,S.K., Zeng,Q.,
            Zimmer,A.R., Rosenthal,A., Birren,B.W., Platzer,M., Shimizu,N. and
            Lander,E.S.
  TITLE     DNA sequence and analysis of human chromosome 8
  JOURNAL   Nature 439 (7074), 331-335 (2006)
   PUBMED   16421571
REFERENCE   2  (bases 1 to 18)
  CONSRTM   International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium
  TITLE     Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome
  JOURNAL   Nature 431 (7011), 931-945 (2004)
   PUBMED   15496913
REFERENCE   3  (bases 1 to 18)
  AUTHORS   Lander,E.S., Linton,L.M., Birren,B., Nusbaum,C., Zody,M.C.,
            Baldwin,J., Devon,K., Dewar,K., Doyle,M., FitzHugh,W., Funke,R.,
            Gage,D., Harris,K., Heaford,A., Howland,J., Kann,L., Lehoczky,J.,
            LeVine,R., McEwan,P., McKernan,K., Meldrim,J., Mesirov,J.P.,
            Miranda,C., Morris,W., Naylor,J., Raymond,C., Rosetti,M.,
            Santos,R., Sheridan,A., Sougnez,C., Stange-Thomann,N.,
            Stojanovic,N., Subramanian,A., Wyman,D., Rogers,J., Sulston,J.,
            Ainscough,R., Beck,S., Bentley,D., Burton,J., Clee,C., Carter,N.,
            Coulson,A., Deadman,R., Deloukas,P., Dunham,A., Dunham,I.,
            Durbin,R., French,L., Grafham,D., Gregory,S., Hubbard,T.,
            Humphray,S., Hunt,A., Jones,M., Lloyd,C., McMurray,A., Matthews,L.,
            Mercer,S., Milne,S., Mullikin,J.C., Mungall,A., Plumb,R., Ross,M.,
            Shownkeen,R., Sims,S., Waterston,R.H., Wilson,R.K., Hillier,L.W.,
            McPherson,J.D., Marra,M.A., Mardis,E.R., Fulton,L.A.,
            Chinwalla,A.T., Pepin,K.H., Gish,W.R., Chissoe,S.L., Wendl,M.C.,
            Delehaunty,K.D., Miner,T.L., Delehaunty,A., Kramer,J.B., Cook,L.L.,
            Fulton,R.S., Johnson,D.L., Minx,P.J., Clifton,S.W., Hawkins,T.,
            Branscomb,E., Predki,P., Richardson,P., Wenning,S., Slezak,T.,
            Doggett,N., Cheng,J.F., Olsen,A., Lucas,S., Elkin,C.,
            Uberbacher,E., Frazier,M., Gibbs,R.A., Muzny,D.M., Scherer,S.E.,
            Bouck,J.B., Sodergren,E.J., Worley,K.C., Rives,C.M., Gorrell,J.H.,
            Metzker,M.L., Naylor,S.L., Kucherlapati,R.S., Nelson,D.L.,
            Weinstock,G.M., Sakaki,Y., Fujiyama,A., Hattori,M., Yada,T.,
            Toyoda,A., Itoh,T., Kawagoe,C., Watanabe,H., Totoki,Y., Taylor,T.,
            Weissenbach,J., Heilig,R., Saurin,W., Artiguenave,F., Brottier,P.,
            Bruls,T., Pelletier,E., Robert,C., Wincker,P., Smith,D.R.,
            Doucette-Stamm,L., Rubenfield,M., Weinstock,K., Lee,H.M.,
            Dubois,J., Rosenthal,A., Platzer,M., Nyakatura,G., Taudien,S.,
            Rump,A., Yang,H., Yu,J., Wang,J., Huang,G., Gu,J., Hood,L.,
            Rowen,L., Madan,A., Qin,S., Davis,R.W., Federspiel,N.A.,
            Abola,A.P., Proctor,M.J., Myers,R.M., Schmutz,J., Dickson,M.,
            Grimwood,J., Cox,D.R., Olson,M.V., Kaul,R., Raymond,C., Shimizu,N.,
            Kawasaki,K., Minoshima,S., Evans,G.A., Athanasiou,M., Schultz,R.,
            Roe,B.A., Chen,F., Pan,H., Ramser,J., Lehrach,H., Reinhardt,R.,
            McCombie,W.R., de la Bastide,M., Dedhia,N., Blocker,H.,
            Hornischer,K., Nordsiek,G., Agarwala,R., Aravind,L., Bailey,J.A.,
            Bateman,A., Batzoglou,S., Birney,E., Bork,P., Brown,D.G.,
            Burge,C.B., Cerutti,L., Chen,H.C., Church,D., Clamp,M.,
            Copley,R.R., Doerks,T., Eddy,S.R., Eichler,E.E., Furey,T.S.,
            Galagan,J., Gilbert,J.G., Harmon,C., Hayashizaki,Y., Haussler,D.,
            Hermjakob,H., Hokamp,K., Jang,W., Johnson,L.S., Jones,T.A.,
            Kasif,S., Kaspryzk,A., Kennedy,S., Kent,W.J., Kitts,P.,
            Koonin,E.V., Korf,I., Kulp,D., Lancet,D., Lowe,T.M., McLysaght,A.,
            Mikkelsen,T., Moran,J.V., Mulder,N., Pollara,V.J., Ponting,C.P.,
            Schuler,G., Schultz,J., Slater,G., Smit,A.F., Stupka,E.,
            Szustakowski,J., Thierry-Mieg,D., Thierry-Mieg,J., Wagner,L.,
            Wallis,J., Wheeler,R., Williams,A., Wolf,Y.I., Wolfe,K.H.,
            Yang,S.P., Yeh,R.F., Collins,F., Guyer,M.S., Peterson,J.,
            Felsenfeld,A., Wetterstrand,K.A., Patrinos,A., Morgan,M.J., de
            Jong,P., Catanese,J.J., Osoegawa,K., Shizuya,H., Choi,S. and
            Chen,Y.J.
  CONSRTM   International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium
  TITLE     Initial sequencing and analysis of the human genome
  JOURNAL   Nature 409 (6822), 860-921 (2001)
   PUBMED   11237011
  REMARK    Erratum:[Nature 2001 Aug 2;412(6846):565]
COMMENT     REFSEQ INFORMATION: The reference sequence is identical to
            CM000670.2.
            On Feb 3, 2014 this sequence version replaced NC_000008.10.
            Assembly Name: GRCh38.p13 Primary Assembly
            The DNA sequence is composed of genomic sequence, primarily
            finished clones that were sequenced as part of the Human Genome
            Project. PCR products and WGS shotgun sequence have been added
            where necessary to fill gaps or correct errors. All such additions
            are manually curated by GRC staff. For more information see:
            https://genomereference.org.
            
            ##Genome-Annotation-Data-START##
            Annotation Provider         :: NCBI
            Annotation Status           :: Updated annotation
            Annotation Name             :: Homo sapiens Updated Annotation
                                           Release 109.20200815
            Annotation Version          :: 109.20200815
            Annotation Pipeline         :: NCBI eukaryotic genome annotation
                                           pipeline
            Annotation Software Version :: 8.5
            Annotation Method           :: Best-placed RefSeq; propagated
                                           RefSeq model
            Features Annotated          :: Gene; mRNA; CDS; ncRNA
            ##Genome-Annotation-Data-END##
FEATURES             Location/Qualifiers
     source          1..18
                     /organism="Homo sapiens"
                     /mol_type="genomic DNA"
                     /db_xref="taxon:9606"
                     /chromosome="8"
ORIGIN      
        1 ctccctttgt tgtgttgt
//