Spain to limit high retail price of Covid home-testing kits

Antigen tests currently cost as much as €10 in Spain.

Spain’s government is working on rules to limit the retail price of antigen tests for Covid-19, the country’s prime minister Pedro Sanchez has said, after shortages were reported in many pharmacies across the country last month.

Price rises during the surge in Omicron cases and the scarcity of tests in pharmacies have raised protests from opposition politicians and consumer groups in Spain, many of whom are calling for tests to be sold in supermarkets.

"The debate we had before and during the Christmas season was the supply of tests, there was a bottleneck," Mr Sanchez said. 

"Now, we will get into the control of the tests' prices," he said.

Mr Sanchez said it might be time to use different parameters to track the pandemic as Covid-19 becomes less deadly, confirming an earlier report that the authorities were considering monitoring it in a similar way they follow the flu – without recording every case or testing all symptomatic people.

A liberalisation of the market for antigen tests would be more efficient than a cap on prices, centre-right opposition leader Ines Arrimadas said.

"Not far from here, in Portugal, people can go and buy tests in their local super[market]," she told reporters.

Antigen tests sell for about €3 in neighbouring Portugal while they cost some €10 in Spain, where they are only available in pharmacies, Ms Arrimadas said.

Spain's Covid infection rate as measured over the past 14 days hit a new record of 2,723 cases per 100,000 people on Friday, an increase of more than 10-fold since the start of December.

Intensive care occupancy reached 22%, up from 8% a month ago but still only half the peak of 43% recorded a year ago.

Spain will purchase 344,000 doses of Pfizer's Covid-19 antiviral pill in January, Mr Sanchez also said on Monday.

The pill, Paxlovid, is for adults who have mild to moderate infection and are at high risk of their illness worsening, and is most effective when taken during the early stages of Covid-19, before any eventual hospitalisation.

Meanwhile, Spain plans to issue €75bn in bonds over 2022, roughly in line with last year's total, while strong demand from international investors looks set to continue, the country's treasury chief Carlos Cuerpo said.

In gross terms, the government will issue some €237bn, down from €264.3bn last year, Mr Cuerpo said

Spanish net issuance soared to €110bn in 2020 as the government reeled from the unexpected financial strain of tackling the pandemic, before receding to €75.1bn last year.

Spain's finances will be bolstered by the arrival of about €26.3bn in EU recovery funds during the year. Spain closed 2021 with an average negative yield for the first time, meaning investors effectively pay the government to hold its bonds.

• Reuters