I'm happy for the Government to tell me what to do - if it helps keep me alive

It is yet another clear sign of the times in which we live, that the idea of covering your face to stop the spread of a deadly disease has been seen - in some quarters - as a blatant violation of our civil liberties.

It’s a hot topic which first reared its head in the United States – a nation which has always clung so tightly to the idea of individual rights you can only prise it from its cold dead hands – or someone else’s.

Let’s not forget some Americans regarded the introduction of car air bags with deep suspicion - in case they accidentally went off while they were out on the highway – yet saw few health and safety concerns in keeping a loaded revolver in the glovebox.

At the end of the day, covering your mouth right now is simply a matter of politeness.

Tony Hancock hit the nail on the head when he sang, to the tune of Deutschland Uber Alles: ‘Coughs and sneezes spread diseases, trap the germs in your handkerchief’.

Admittedly the hankie’s role in combating infection has taken a blow since it was most often deployed by mothers who used their own saliva to try and clean up their kids’ grubby faces. But the principle of doing anything to limit the possible spread of disease – especially one for which we currently have no cure – seems more than eminently sensible.

Nobody has claimed that wearing a mask is going to completely stop the transmission of Covid 19, nor does wearing one grant you coronavirus immunity, but it can help to reduce infection. What’s not to like about that?

Presumably those incensed by this nanny state interference also campaigned against other pernicious government plots, like robbing us of the right to be flung to our deaths through windscreens by the imposition of seatbelts – or indeed the use of those airbags which so bothers some of our cousins in the US of A.

Personally, I hope any complaints about our elected representatives trying to keep us alive stay firmly on that side of the Atlantic.

It’s often been said that when America sneezes, Britain catches a cold – let’s just hope this time it isn’t something far more serious.