ONE of the coach drivers who took Britons arriving back from coronavirus epicentre Wuhan to their quarantine unit says they were told not to wear protective suits.

As photos emerged of a medic in full hazmat gear next to Peter Badger, the 54-year-old revealed how he drove the 180 miles from RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire to Arrowe Park Hospital in the Wirral, Merseyside, without even so much as a face mask while evacuees sat in the back.

His boss, Horseman Coaches director James Horseman, told The Times that the department of health had decreed the danger from driving while wearing a suit was greater than the risk of catching the virus. Mr Badger added: ‘To be honest, if I was wearing a hazmat suit I wouldn’t be able to drive that sort of distance.’