Background
The worldwide outbreak of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has already put healthcare workers (HCWs) at a high risk of infection.1 The question of how to give HCWs the best protection against infection is a priority. Reports of personal protective equipment (PPE) shortages, with regional and international differences in the approach to deployment of PPE have repeatedly made national media headlines.2 During the past few months, as the UK has tackled the coronavirus pandemic, HCWs including doctors and nurses have complained of a lack of adequate PPE kit such as gowns, masks and gloves.
Many readers of this journal have been working closely with patients with COVID-19 in recent weeks, and so have a personal interest in ensuring that such evidence as exists is made available and applied in the everyday clinical setting in the UK and elsewhere.