Health screening for the work permit: what is tested, where, and what fails you

The health screening is a tuberculosis and vaccination check run by Malta’s Infectious Disease Prevention and Control Unit. It is done in Malta, through private clinics, applied for online by your employer, and nobody abroad can sell you a shortcut. Here is what happens and what to prepare.

Who is screened

Most non-EU nationals applying for a work permit. Since May 2026 the list of screened jobs for people from low-risk countries grew to include administrative workers, construction and manual workers, footballers, hairdressers and make-up artists, transport workers, cleaners and housekeepers, security guards, delivery staff and non-medical laboratory technicians. If you were born in, or lived six months or more in, a country on the health authority’s high or very high tuberculosis-risk list, you are screened whatever the job.

What is checked

• Diphtheria, tetanus and polio. Everyone must show immunity, and everyone receives one polio-diphtheria dose in Malta. Refusing it means the application is rejected.
• Measles, mumps and rubella. Mandatory for doctors, dentists, nurses, midwives, allied health professions, carers, nannies and child carers, and for all female applicants whatever the job.
• Hepatitis B. For health professions, carers, beauty and spa therapists, massage therapists and tattooists: a blood test before vaccination, then proof of vaccination.
• Chest X-ray. For anyone born in or resident six months or more in a high-risk tuberculosis country. Taken within six weeks of the application date. A previous X-ray from the last year can be reused when you change job.
• Vaccination records. Shown to the doctor. If you cannot show a record, the full course is repeated in Malta. A booster alone is not accepted.

Where and how

Every test and every vaccination is carried out in Malta through private health providers. Your employer, or their HR, opens the application on the online portal with their e-ID and uploads a signed employee-employer consent form and your passport bio page. Food handlers also upload the Food Safety Commission card. One doctor completes the form online; you or the employer book the appointment.

Processing takes up to 15 working days from a complete application. Urgent requests are not considered. The result is an automated email saying “full clearance”. Print it; Identità wants it, and you book your Identità appointment only after it arrives.

Cost: the health authority’s pages do not state one. The clinic charges you or your employer for the tests. Ask the employer in writing who pays before you book.

Applying from abroad

Identità’s checklist lists the clearance email as a document; it is one item on the full Single Permit checklist. The health authority says tests are done in Malta. Ask your employer at which step Identità expects the clearance for your application. Do not pay a clinic in your home country for a “Malta medical certificate”. It is not on any Maltese list. The India page covers the whole route for Indian passports.

Renewals

One repeat screening, a year after the first, for people from very high-risk tuberculosis countries in any job, and for doctors, dentists, nurses, midwives, allied health, carers, nannies, food handlers, beauty and spa therapists and tattooists. People from other countries renewing in administrative, construction, transport, cleaning, security, delivery or similar jobs skip it. Same portal, same 15 working days. The renewal rules, one year or two, have their own page.

What fails you

• Refusing the polio-diphtheria dose.
• An X-ray older than six weeks, or none at all when your country is on the list.
• A positive result that the doctor refers for treatment. This delays rather than ends the application; follow the doctor. Health care in Malta for workers is on its own page.
• Paper applications by email, no longer accepted since 4 May 2026.

Check this at the source

• First-time applicants: who, what, where, the online system. https://hpdp.gov.mt/idcu/work_permits_for_first_time_applicants
• Renewals. https://hpdp.gov.mt/idcu/health_screening_for_renewal_of_work_permit
• The portal your employer uses. https://expatriateshealthscreening.gov.mt