The worry these days, is how to protect frontline healthcare workers who are determined to go to work to help those affected by Covid-19. Singapore for example has not recorded single healthcare-related transmission of the virus although hundreds of cases of patients infected with coronavirus have been identified and were undergoing treatment. The hope, in this case, could be linked to a battery of protective measures that are related to testing, supplies of protective equipment, personal hygiene, systematic ward protective actions and coordinated communications around the day to day management of these precautionary measures. Although it is recommended for health care workers to maintain social distancing of roughly two meters in the UK or again six feet in other countries, the practicality of this specific measure can be short-lived due to nurses finding themselves inevitably in the same room or standing closer than expected which could then appear to defeat the social distancing strategy, some may argue.

The lessons learned from countries where the transmission has been under control indicate that transmission seems to occur primarily during sustained exposure to an infected person and the failure to follow basic protection such as covering your mouth when sneezing, washing your hand after contact with secretions, hand washing in-between visits to patients, avoiding hand contact with colleagues, disinfecting work surfaces, maintaining the ward or work environment on a constant cycle of ventilation and ensuring quarantine national guidelines measures are followed whenever symptoms are identified on a patient or staff.

Overall whenever possible social distancing at work should be observed; whenever this is not possible, then one should safely manage proximity at work by observing hand hygiene, surface decontamination, covering mouth when coughing, sneezing, etc…