This is not medical advice. I am the last person who should be giving medical advice. Except maybe for Doctor Who, who’s neither a medical practitioner or a PHD, just a conman with a phonebox, or Dr Hannibal Lecter, who’d eat you as soon as cure you. So, when I ask, can you still train with the coronavirus, I’m being half serious.

Can you train with the coronavirus? If it was a cold or flu or a broken leg then, for most runners, the answer is “yes, just run it off!”.

Amateur athletes are notorious for training and racing while ill. We assume that any cough or headache or Ebola virus is just a sign that the training is working. Of course, I’m not well, I’ve been training!

But yesterday I went swimming and I thought: “Should I be here?”. Should I be in a swimming pool that’s a coronavirus cocktail of sweat and spit and whatever else has washed off the bodies of a thousands swimmers?

What about the changing room? Do you need a hazmat suit just to change out of my birthday suit in a room filled with perspiring bodybuilders?

Or do you assume that this is no different to any other cold or flu or bug and live life normally until the government says otherwise?

It seems as if many have already started to panic. There are no toilet rolls or pasta on supermarket shelves. Personally, if I was stockpiling for two weeks I’d be stocking up chocolate biscuits and cake. Stuff fusilli pasta, if I’m coughing and hacking, I want a KitKat.

I don’t get the obsession with pasta either. After the virus started in China there were numerous people saying they wouldn’t eat Chinese food. Now the virus is in Italy, we’re eating Spaghetti Bolognese like our lives depended on it (literally).

Not to mention we’re washing our hands for 20 seconds. The Government says you should sing ‘Happy Birthday’ twice. I don’t think you need a song though – just wash your hands like you’ve just killed a man and don’t want to get caught. You don’t need soap to clean hands, just pretend you have a guilty conscience.

But if water and soap is effective then all you need to do if you want to swim is pour some liquid soap in the pool. Turn it into a sink. That way 2000 metres will leave you cleaner than an Italian hypochondriac eating Kung Pow Chicken.

And if you’re adding soap then also add conditioner for your hair. I was told by a hairdresser that if you want to avoid damaging hair with chorine then apply some conditioner before you swim. Now, you’re not just training, you’re protecting yourself too. With all the soapy water, you’re immune from the coronavirus.

Possibly.

As I said, I’m not a Doctor, and this is definitely not medical advice.

But if you want proper advice then I’d point you in the direction of the Swim England guidance for swimming in swimming pools, which includes the following quote:

“Water and the chlorine within swimming pools will help to kill the virus. However, visitors to swimming pools are reminded to shower before using the pool, to shower on leaving the pool and to follow the necessary hygiene precautions when visiting public places to help reduce the risk of infection.”

You can read the full guidance here