Doctors in contact with coronavirus patients who used self-testing kits must report the cases to the public health authorities, but an effective system is still not in place for this to be done.

The virus is one of 72 notifiable infectious diseases and, by law, any healthcare professional who comes across a notifiable infectious disease is duty-bound to report it to public health.

This effectively means that while patients who test positive for the virus using the newly-legalised self-testing kits are not required to inform the public health authorities, medical professionals are.

And according to the guidelines issued on Monday alongside the legal notice outlining the rules for self-testing kits, anyone who gets a positive test is to “contact a GP for further clinical assistance and guidance”.

It is not yet clear if the authorities will be keeping tabs on those who test positive using self-test kits and how this will work, especially since the law is aimed at regulating professionals and not individuals.

Questions sent to the health authorities on the matter have remained unanswered.

Doctors who spoke to Times of Malta said they have not yet been provided with guidelines on how to report patients who get positive results from self-testing kits.

One doctor, who did not wish to be named, said he was reluctant to trust the result since he had no way of knowing whether the patient took the test properly.

“I am not going to report a case based on what my patient is telling me,” he said.

“We always carry out our own investigations to be sure of things and this should be no different,” he added.

Another agreed, saying that clear guidelines on procedures are needed.

When contacted, Medical Association of Malta (MAM) president Martin Balzan said he was not aware of any guidelines being given to doctors yet.

Balzan also echoed the doctors’ concerns over the fact patients will be carrying out their own tests.

“We are now going to be in a situation where we have to rely on the patient and trust they do the test correctly. That could be a problem,” he said.

According to the new measures, the self-testing kits can only be sold in pharmacies and results from these tests are not valid for overseas travel or other forms of COVID-19 status certification.