Unhelpful advice

One would hope that advice would generally be given with a view to helping a given situation but, in my view, the recent interim guidance from the World Health Organization (WHO) regarding the current provision of essential oral health services¹ falls short of that hope. Its purpose is ‘to address specific needs and considerations for essential oral health services in the context of COVID-19, with the guidance being intended for public health authorities, chief dental officers and oral health care personnel working in private and public health sectors’.

It starts, rightly, by stating that effective prevention of oral problems should remain a high priority, with patients being given advice through remote consultation or social media channels. The document then suggests screening of patients before appointments or triage done on arrival, again something that readers would, I feel, agree with. So far, so good! It then adds that ‘only patients requiring urgent or emergency (care) – (that word seems to have been omitted in the document) receive treatment and that they have no symptoms suggestive of COVID-19 infection’. This was reported in the UK press on 11 August, as ‘people should not go to non-urgent dentist appointments until COVID-19 risk is better understood’. Not helpful.