Two more private labs granted ‘provisional license’ for PCR testing

Two private labs – Sheriff Medical and Coastal Diagnostics – have been granted provisional licenses to conduct COVID-19 PCR testing, Minister of Health, Dr Frank Anthony, revealed on Tuesday during the daily COVID-19 update.

Dr Anthony explained that while the two labs have everything in place for testing and are capable of conducting the tests, they still have to go through a three-month period of monitoring and once the standards are maintained, a full license will be granted.

The other labs which were granted permission for PCR testing are the Eureka Medical Laboratory and the National Public Health Reference Lab. Even though it only now received a provisional license, Sheriff Medical has been advertising and conducting PCR testing since last year.

“We have two additional, which is Coastal Diagnostics and Sheriff Medical laboratories; both of them have been given provisional license because we tend to assess on a regular basis until we are comfortable and then we make sure they are granted the full license once they comply with all the things that we require,” Dr Anthony stated.

The labs are mandated to send the data received from testing to the ministry’s surveillance unit. According to Dr Anthony, if there are any positive cases, it will be added to the ministry’s official records.

“We are constantly updating the information,” the Health Minister said.

Meanwhile, there are eight labs and hospitals in the country that were granted approval to do conduct rapid antigen testing.