England’s chief medical officer has warned the public wearing face masks will do little to combat the ongoing coronavirus outbreak.
Professor Chris Whitty told Sky News on Wednesday that wearing a face mask had almost no effect on reducing the risk of contracting the illness.
Prof Whitty said: “In terms of wearing a mask, our advice is clear: that wearing a mask if you don’t have an infection reduces the risk almost not at all. So we do not advise that.”
“The only people we do sometimes use masks for are people who have got an infection and that is to help them to stop it spreading around," he added.
