Updated 3.45pm with details about guidelines
Pharmacies in Malta were still unable to sell COVID-19 self-testing kits as of Monday morning, one week after the Health Minister had publicly announced they would now be permitted.
While self-test kits have been available on the black market for months, the Chamber of Pharmacists confirmed that no such kits will be sold by local pharmacies until there is relative legislation in place.
That legislation remained missing until later on Monday afternoon, when a legal notice, together with guidelines for the use of self-test kits, were published.
According to the guidelines, self-testing kits can only be sold by pharmacies and are not valid for travel or any form of COVID-19 certification. Kits must be approved by the Malta Medicines Authority. Nasal and saliva kits are both accepted.
The guidelines also do not impose reporting rules: anyone who tests positive for COVID-19 through a home test will not be required to report themselves to health authorities.
Instead, the guidelines advise users to contact their GP "to obtain guidance on clinical management and on isolation/quarantine of household members."
Views differ on self-test kits
Doctors have divergent opinions about home test kits. While some are hesitant about their reliability, others believe they will alleviate the pressure on the government’s testing facilities.
Those in the medical profession pointed out that home tests are “operator-dependent” and the result could be skewed if the person does not test correctly.
But the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control said self-tests can offer advantages when used to complement professionally administered tests.
They can improve accessibility to testing and allow individuals to obtain the result very quickly, and reduce further community transmission. Self-testing could therefore enhance disease control with prompt identification and isolation of cases.
However, the ECDC also said it could be difficult to monitor disease trends over time.
Procedure for positive results still unknown
The Health Minister announced last week that self-testing kits would become legal within the week, but they remained unregulated until guidelines were published later on Monday.
Prior to that, self-testing kits were expressly forbidden by law, with LN357 of 2021 stating that devices for self-testing "shall not be made available, put into service, distributed or used in Malta’ and that ‘the sale of such kits directly to the public is prohibited".
Self-testing kits have been available in most European countries for several months.
In France, one can expect to pay anything between €1.25 and €5 for a self-testing kit. In Belgium, the cost hovers between €6 and €8. In other countries, like the UK and Cyprus, test kits are distributed to the public free of charge on a weekly basis.
In Malta, these kits have been on the black market for a few months. One woman who spoke to the Times of Malta said she had bought one such kit for €6 in September, but an identical test bought four months later from the same person cost €25.
The reason for the substantial price change, she was told, was the increase in demand.