Professor Watson said his greatest hope was that Australia could get through this pandemic with minimal loss of life.

“My other hope is that we find an appropriate cure for this. There are treatments which are already being trialled and we are involved in those in WA. Also, that we try and find a vaccine as well – which is harder to develop.

“My greatest fear is that we have ‘the storm’ that WA’s Premier is talking about; and that could still come, although the curves are looking good in WA and across Australia. That storm will be a whole load of people getting infected by pandemic COVID-19 at the same time.

“But if everyone gets on board with social isolation, understands that we are doing this for a reason, hopefully that storm will not happen.”

Professor Watson said already many of his colleagues who had trained at UWA were being incredibly brave and working incredibly hard addressing demands created by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It does take a lot of bravery to get up in the morning and go into the workplace and understand that you are putting yourself in a situation where potentially you could become infected by the virus, even with appropriate protective equipment.

“I am in awe of them. I applaud them for their work.”