An infectious disease specialist has warned that people must be encouraged to wear face masks rather than forced.

It follows concern about the low numbers of people wearing face coverings on public transport or in enclosed spaces.

On Lunchtime Live this afternoon, RCSI Professor Sam McConkey said making them mandatory could see a public backlash.

“I would be more in the nudge and encouragement camp here rather than the mandatory one,” he said.

“Sometimes when people have public policy that makes something mandatory that they are not very comfortable with, you get a reaction.

“People are upset and are you going to put people in prison and fine them thousands of Euros for not wearing masks? I think that would be harsh and would produce an even bigger backlash.”

Darcey Skelly wearing a face mask cleaning MUJI on Chatham Street in Dublin in preparation for reopening on Monday, 05-06-2020. Image: Sasko Lazarov/RollingNews

On The Hard Shoulder however Professor Jack Lambert from the UCD School of Medicine said the use of face masks should be mandatory.

“I think it should be,” he said.

“I mean we are placing all this emphasis on social distancing in most situations and it is actually not practical.

“How can you open up companies, how can you open up supermarkets, how can you open up the city to public transportation if 80% of the facilities can’t be used because of social distancing.”

He said face masks should be the number one tool in the fight against the spread of the virus.

“The major thing that makes a difference to me, as far as I am concerned, is that a face mask is number one, social distance is number two and handwashing is number three," he said.

“All three of them are important but by putting all this emphasis on social distancing at the expense of face masks and these other things, I think, is a mistake.

Confusion

Professor McConkey said the changing advise around the use of masks has led to a public loss of confidence in their effectiveness.

“That is confusing whenever there is a change in the message it also leads to perhaps loss of confidence.

“People will say, ‘well you said something different three months ago, how can you say this now?’

“That is because we are learning as we go along with this new virus. Many of us acknowledged at the beginning that there was going to be learning and that will involve change – and thankfully involves change.

“Now, we are much more relaxed about where we can travel than we were six weeks ago, so we are in an evolving situation.”

A passenger wearing a face mask on a Luas tram in Dublin, 13-03-2020. Image: Sam Boal/RollingNews

Professor McConkey said scientific opinion on the matter largely changed about six weeks ago, when new evidence showed that people were transmitting the virus to others before they started experiencing symptoms themselves.

He said we have work to do to make masks more culturally normal in Ireland and said increased efforts to encourage people to but them or make them at home would help.

The RCSI professor said officials and Government ministers should lead by example and wear masks when they appear in public.