Maltese health authorities will accept AstraZeneca vaccines even if they have been manufactured in India under amended travel guidelines, Britain’s transport secretary Grant Shapps said on Wednesday.
The news has also been confirmed by Malta's Health Ministry, with a spokesperson telling this newsroom that "we are now accepting all the Astra Zeneca vaccine batches approved by the UK MHRA."
Shapps tweeted that Maltese authorities had amended travel advices so that “anyone who has an Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine in the UK (regardless of manufacture location) is able to travel without being turned away.”
He said that all vaccines have gone through rigorous safety and quality checks.
Malta initially said that they would not be accepting doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine which were manufactured in India on the basis that these are not recognised by the European Medicines Agency – even though they are just as effective as the AstraZeneca doses manufactured in Europe.
Last week, a British couple was in fact turned away from travelling to Malta to see their son because they had been administered with the Indian-made version of the AstraZeneca jab.
Around 5 million Brits are estimated to have received the Indian-version of the jab.