Avon and Somerset police announced their plan to issue spit guards to all operational officers from January next year. “Each day we face being spat at, putting us at risk of HIV, hepatitis and tuberculosis and the degrading assault can have a lasting psychological impact,” said Assistant Chief Constable Stephen Cullen. He described an incident in which he arrested a drunk woman who had hepatitis C after she attacked a paramedic. “She was continually spitting, spit that was bloody. “HIV is irrelevant to the debate about spit hoods because spitting simply is not an HIV transmission route,” she said.

Source: The Guardian November 17, 2017 15:56 UTC