Supermarket chain a.mart will begin selling domestically manufactured COVID-19 antigen rapid test kits from Thursday at 10 of its stores in northern Taiwan, the company announced Wednesday.
According to a.mart, each test kit for a single use will be priced at NT$180 (US$6.1), with shoppers to be allowed to buy a maximum of two tests at one time.
The COVID-19 self-test kits, manufactured by Taiwan’s Eternal Materials Co., will be sold at 10 a.mart stores with drug licenses in Keelung, Taipei, New Taipei, Taoyuan, and Hsinchu City
They are Keelung Store, Zhongxiao Store and Jingmei Store in Taipei; Yonghe Store, Sanchong Store, Banqiao Nanya Store in New Taipei; Taoyuan Store and Yangmei Store in Taoyuan; as well as Hsinchu Store and Jucheng Store in Hsinchu City.
Eternal Materials announced April 21 that it has received authorization from the Taiwan Food and Drug Administration to manufacture COVID-19 antigen rapid test kits under a special exemption and that the company would begin shipping the kits in May.
Amid skyrocketing demand for rapid tests due to a spike in domestic COVID-19 infections, the government launched a name-based rationing scheme for the sale of rapid test kits on April 28.
Other retailers
In addition to a.mart, retailers including Carrefour Taiwan, Cosmed, and Watsons have also been selling such tests in limited quantities.
Carrefour currently offers FORA/VTRUST and Roche COVID-19 antigen rapid tests, with the price for a single-use kit of FORA/VTRUST set at NT$200 and NT$975 for a pack of five.
Tuan Fang-chi (???), a pharmacist who works in an a.mart pharmacy said that with an increasing number of individuals with mild symptoms of COVID-19 who have been in home isolation, cold medicines, which can be used to relieve symptoms, have also been in greater demand recently.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel