Scientists and health experts have confirmed that newspapers are not transmitters of Covid-19 owing to the ink and the printing process they go through.

Speaking on Good Morning Britain earlier today, and setting the record straight regarding newspapers safety, Dr Hilary Jones, said: "For public health information right now it's important people have access to information through newspapers.”

Dr Hilary stressed that they were an essential service and that "it's possible to deliver newspapers safely".

He said: "If someone physically picks them up and delivers them to a doorstep or letterbox it's safe."

John Innes Centre virologist George Lomonossoff, who uses molecular biology to understand the assembly and properties of viruses in the United Kingdom, said: “Newspapers are pretty sterile because of the way they are printed and the process they’ve been through.

"Traditionally, people have eaten fish and chips out of them for that very reason.

"So all of the ink and the print makes them actually quite sterile. The chances of that are infinitesimal.”

"Newspapers are pretty sterile because of the way they are printed and the process they’ve been through..."

It said: “The likelihood of an infected person contaminating commercial goods is low and the risk of catching the virus that causes Covid-19 from a package that has been moved, travelled, and exposed to different conditions and temperate is also low.”

Since the Covid-19 outbreak, the KM has been providing free access to all its newspapers in digital format for those unable to get to their local shop, supermarket or petrol station.

The new app, called IM News, contains every newspaper in the KM portfolio which stretches across the county.

Access it for free by visiting subsaver.co.uk/imn and entering the promotional code TRUST.

You will then be emailed details of how to download it from the Apple or Google Play stores.

If you do not have a smartphone or tablet, you can also browse editions on your desktop computer by clicking here.

Read more: Keeping Kent connected during the coronavirus crisis

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