Doctors need to wear protective goggles and gloves when checking patients for eye disease, say researchers who have found that SARS-CoV-2 may be present in conjunctival secretions of infected patients.

However, whether the virus can be transmitted through conjunctiva remains to be determined, according to the report from China.

According to the findings in Acta Ophthalmologica, 37 patients with COVID-19 pneumonia underwent reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction testing to look for evidence of the virus in conjunctival secretion.

Some 12 of these patients had severe, and the others mild, COVID-19. Three patients also had conjunctival congestion and other inflammatory ocular findings.