Brits may have to wear face masks in lockdown ease

The government has been receiving expert advice on how the UK can move out of lockdown from a number of expert groups. The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies, also known as SAGE is the main point of contact for the government to receive scientific advice on the coronavirus pandemic.

Dr Ben Killingley is an expert in infectious diseases from the University College London Hospital and a member of NERVTAG, a group working with SAGE, which has reviewed the research on face masks – a field in which he's an expert. He joined Matt Frei to discuss the ins and outs face masks in the UK's lift from lockdown.

Matt struck quickly with Dr Killingley, asking "what is the protective value of a face mask", to which he replied "the evidence of around how effective face mask use is is not that good." The main problem in research up to this point is that we have never faced a pandemic of this scale in modern times, the infectious disease expert revealed.

"The trouble with some of these studies is that they're not conducted in a pandemic situation" he told Matt, adding that "the reason why we haven't gone straight to face masks is because the evidence isn't really there." Shedding light onto his research, Dr Killingley told Matt that "we're thinking of wearing them as we start to meet people again because it's really when we're around people that they have their value."

Accepting that the research hasn't been done yet, Matt argued that "if you have to toss the coin especially if you're worried being around other people, surely it's better to wear them full stop." Dr Killingley accepted the idea, but insisted that his department "need to make sure we're not using up all the masks for the public" adding that there was the idea circulated that the public could wear cloth masks rather than medical grade face masks.

"If you mandate the government on face masks there'll be a run on them" Matt said and Dr Killingley then reiterated "we really need to preserve the supply of face masks to hospital."

The infectious disease expert told Matt "one of the things that's coming is when lockdown is released we need to rely on the public to still behave abnormally."

Matt seemed disillusioned by the research of Dr Killingley, jokingly stating "when you talk to scientists, on so many aspects the science is quite fuzzy."

"We'll have more information going forward but it's then very much up to the policy makers to listen to the scientists and try and find a way forward for the public" Dr Killingley said. "Although we may look closer to normal we're still going to be relying on the public engaging with the process."

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