Joggers should consider wearing a face mask, two UK experts warned on Tuesday. 

Current UK government guidance only mandates face coverings in certain indoor settings, such as on public transport or in shops.

Devi Sridhar, professor of public health at the University of Edinburgh, said joggers should wear a mask whenever they are likely to run directly past other people. "Runners should try to be attentive to pedestrians, because the sidewalks are there for pedestrians and busy areas and high streets," he said. Once in open space, it would be reasonable to "take off your mask and run freely."

Trish Greenhalgh, professor in primary care health sciences at the University of Oxford, warned on Tuesday that people could catch COVID-19 from joggers breathing heavily as they pass.

"There is no doubt the virus is in the air, there is no doubt that you can catch it if you inhale and that someone else has exhaled," Greenhalgh told the Good Morning Britain television show.

She added: "The puffing and panting jogger – you can feel their breath come and sometimes actually feel yourself inhale it, so there's no doubt that there is a danger there."

There has been much debate in the past year over the risk of contracting COVID-19 through air during exercise. Last May, CGTN's Shini Somara spoke to Bert Blocken from Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands about his research mapping the flow of the particles we breathe out to see how they are affected by rapid movement.

Blocken's research revealed that professional cyclists were at significant risk of contracting COVID-19 if riding in a peloton with an infected rider. He told the RAZOR program: "If on the first day of a multi-stage race one rider has a cold, a few days later the whole peloton has this cold."

You can see his explanation in the video above.