The health authorities are carrying out about 2,300 COVID tests daily, according to the latest EU figures as the positivity rate drops to the lowest rate since June.

The Maltese health authorities stopped providing details on the number of tests carried out earlier this month when they decided the focus should be shifted to the number of people hospitalised with the virus.

Asked why the authorities stopped providing this information, public health chief Charmaine Gauci directed people to the ECDC data, which she said is publicly available.

According to the latest data published weekly by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), the health authorities carried out a total of 16,191 tests last week. 

Spread over a seven-day period, the average number of daily tests was 2,313.

Positivity rate lowest in months

Despite the number of tests carried out daily being somewhat lower than previous months, the positivity rate - the percentage of positive cases detected out of the total number of tests - has dropped to 1.24.

This is the lowest rate since June. 

This suggests that the drop in daily new cases is not a result of fewer tests being carried out but fewer infections in the community. 

On Thursday, the health authorities reported only 12 new COVID-19 infections as the number of patients in hospital dropped to 15. Four of the patients still require intensive care. 

Meanwhile, according to the ECDC data, Malta's infection rate is currently     93.67 per 100,000 people, while the death rate stands at 19.43. The island's infection rate is now one of the lowest in Europe. 

Despite this, Malta is still on the ECDC's orange travel list and is therefore still one step away from the coveted green list that signals safe travel.

The majority of EU countries are either on the orange list or on the red one, with only a handful of places being on the green list.