Toxicology tests needed to determine the cause of death of 23-year-old Clayton Cachia last January have not yet been carried out because payment has not yet been approved.

"We have a problem," pathologist Marie Therese Camilleri Podestà said when contacted.

Prof. Camilleri Podestà explained that, although the samples were sent abroad, the laboratory wanted a signature approving payment before carrying out the tests.

"They want to know who is paying for them," she said, adding that permission had to be given by Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera, who was conducting the inquiry.

This glitch means the inquiry cannot be concluded, with Prof. Camilleri Podestà being unable to make a complete report. "I can draw the autopsy report but it will not be complete," she said.

When contacted, the magistrate's registrar said there were no pending statements awaiting signatures and the magistrate was still waiting for the reports.

Attempts to contact Prof. Camilleri Podestà again were futile yesterday.

Mr Cachia, a medical representative with a pharmaceutical company, died on January 13, five days after he took the swine flu jab.

The health authorities had all but ruled out any connection between the jab and Mr Cachia's death. However, the case was reported to the European Medicines Authority.

Health director general Ray Busuttil had said that the link was "extremely remote" and the possibility of any connection between the death and the vaccine was much less than one per cent.

Although Mr Cachia's mother, Pauline, had said she could only blame the vaccine for her "healthy" son's death, his sister, Romina, wrote on a Facebook group in memory of her brother that it was not. Ms Cachia said it was "totally a lie" that her brother died "from this flu". She also wrote that, although she knew what had caused her brother's sudden death, she would not make it public.

The family had instructed the authorities not to give out any information about Mr Cachia's death.