Megan A Hansen, Nkgomeleng A Lekodeba, Joshua M Chevalier, Tom Ockhuisen, Paula Del Rey-Puech, Elena Marban-Castro, Guillermo Zohar Martínez-Pérez, Sonjelle Shilton, Muhammad Radzi Abu Hassan, Vladimir Getia, Catiuscia Weinert-Mizuschima, Maria Isabelle Tenorio Bezerra, Lensa Chala, Robert Leong, Remilekun Peregino, Sara Keller, Ineke Spruijt, Cheryl C Johnson, Sarah J Girdwood, Brooke E Nichols
OBJECTIVE: Diagnostic testing is an important tool to combat the COVID-19 pandemic, yet access to and uptake of testing vary widely 3 years into the pandemic. The WHO recommends the use of COVID-19 self-testing as an option to help expand testing access. We aimed to calculate the cost of providing COVID-19 self-testing across countries and distribution modalities. DESIGN: We estimated economic costs from the provider perspective to calculate the total cost and the cost per self-test kit distributed for three scenarios that differed by costing period (pilot, annual), the number of tests distributed (actual, planned, scaled assuming an epidemic peak) and self-test kit costs (pilot purchase price, 50% reduction)...
April 17, 2024: BMJ Open