Compulsory face masks to lift lockdown 'could jeopardise NHS supply'

'Securing the supply of masks, when there is a huge global demand, is crucial,' say hospital bosses

Ministers have been warned by hospital bosses that the NHS supplies of face masks could be put at risk if they make it compulsory for the public to wear them as part of measures to exit the lockdown.

The government’s scientific advisers are carrying out a review of the usage of face masks today to determine whether the public should be urged to wear them.

The warning from NHS bosses comes after London mayor Sadiq Khan said masks should be made compulsory on public transport. He told Radio 4’s Today programme last week that the measure would be an “additional protection” on top of other social distancing measures during lockdown.

But Chris Hopson, chief executive of NHS Providers, said that “clear evidence” must be provided to justify the recommendation of masks to the public as it may risk taking precious supplies away from the health service.

He said in a statement on Monday: “Fluid repellent masks for health and care staff are key to safety and to avoid the spread of coronavirus.

“Securing the supply of masks, when there is a huge global demand, is crucial. This must be a key consideration for government.

“There needs to be clear evidence that wearing masks, along with other measures, will deliver significant enough benefits to take us out of lockdown to potentially jeopardise NHS mask supply.”

The health secretary also previously warned of the risk posed to NHS supplies if the public wears face masks and urged the public to refrain from wearing them.

Matt Hancock reiterated the World Health Organisation‘s advice that face masks should be “saved for those in health and care who really need them” during a press conference on 10 April.

“It is not a risk-free option for everybody to wear face masks because that means it’s harder to get hold of face masks for people where the science says they’re needed,” he said.

Simon Clarke, the Conservative MP for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland, told BBC Breakfast on Tuesday that there was “no consensus” that advising the public to wear face masks was “the right thing to do”.

He said: “We are focused on making sure that we get proper supplies of PPE, both to the NHS and to all parts of the front line in the fight against coronavirus.

“At this point we do not have a clear scientific steer that it would be right to broaden this to the general population and we would obviously bear in mind the representations from NHS providers about the need to prioritise supply to where it can do the most good.”

Guidance issued by the WHO earlier this month said there is no evidence that a healthy person wearing a mask would be protected from infection and warned that the use of masks by the public can create a “false sense of security”.

Masks can even be a source of infection when not used correctly, added the organisation. The current advice maintains that outside of the healthcare profession, people who are healthy should only wear face masks if they are caring for someone with coronavirus symptoms.

But a campaign group started in the Czech Republic, Masks4All, has called on people to make their own cloth face masks to combat coronavirus, and has garnered the support of over 100 UK medics.

In an open letter signed by UK doctors, the campaign’s UK arm wrote: “There is a great deal of confusion about face masks… Official UK policy is illogical. It says wear a mask to reduce the spread of infection if you become symptomatic, but what about asymptomatic spread?

“The latest guidance on PPE says that people should wear masks in hospital waiting rooms “to reduce both direct transmission and environmental contamination”. Why not elsewhere?

“A government health education campaign is urgently needed to make it clear that masks are not a substitute for staying at home or social distancing, and that N95/FFP2/3 masks must be left for front line NHS staff.”

Professor Babak Javid, a consultant in infectious diseases at Cambridge University Hospitals, told the PA news agency that “population mask wearing should be an important part of the response to Covid”.

“Once Covid cases are largely suppressed, we can stop wearing masks, their incremental gain will be low,” he added. “But now, to really benefit from masks, the majority of us need to wear masks.”

Additional reporting by agencies