The WHO has announced that recent evidence suggests coronavirus can be transmitted through the air.
The virus could potentially say airborne for hours, which is even more worrying with the country beginning to open again.
Highest risk places are crowded indoor areas with bad ventilation, and this is thought to be the reason behind large numbers of infected that have been reported in places like meat factories, churches and restaurants.
Its still unknown how the virus spreads through these tiny droplets (also known as aerosols) that are very small compared to the size of the usual ones a person expels when they cough of sneeze when sick, Linsey Marr, an aerosol expert at Virginia Tech has explained.
Aerosols are released even when a person without symptoms exhales, talks or sings, she explained.
More than 200 other experts have outlined this evidence in an open letter to the World Health Organisation.
What the experts are clear on, however, is that people should continue minimising time indoors with people outside their households.
All schools, nursing homes and businesses should consider investing in powerful air filters and ultraviolet lights that can kill traces of the virus in the air.
Experts have agreed that the virus does not travel long distances or remain capable of surviving in outdoor air.
But evidence has suggested it can travel the length of a room and, in one experiment, remained for roughly three hours.
Although the WHO has warned of larger droplets expelled when someone coughs or sneezes, aerosols are an almost miniature version of these and are released even when someone talks or sings.
This gives an explanation to why people can still spread the virus even without showing typical symptoms.
The aerosols' smaller size means they can carry less of the virus, but means they're lighter and linger for a longer amount of time.
The presence of the virus in the air means that things like social distancing, wearing masks, proper handwashing and cough and sneeze etiquette are just as important, if not more important then before.
Marr said: “We should be placing as much emphasis on masks and ventilation as we do with hand washing,”
“As far as we can tell, this is equally important, if not more important.”
