A study on coronavirus transmission suggests keeping a 2-metre distance indoors without a mask is not enough to prevent it from spreading.
Experts at the University of Cambridge and Imperial College London found it's more likely to be caught inside by two people talking, rather than someone coughing.
Their study says it's because water droplets released when we speak are so small they linger in the air.
“Our knowledge of airborne transmission of SARS-CoV-2 has evolved at an incredible pace, when you consider that it’s been just a year since the virus was identified,” said Dr Pedro de Oliveira from Cambridge’s Department of Engineering, and the paper’s first author.
“There are different ways to approach this problem. In our work, we consider the wide range of respiratory droplets humans exhale to demonstrate different scenarios of airborne viral transmission – the first being the quick spread of small infectious droplets over several metres in a matter of a few seconds, which can happen both indoors and outdoors. Then, we show how these small droplets can accumulate in indoor spaces in the long term, and how this can be mitigated with adequate ventilation.”
The paper is available to download here.
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