Spitting Mad

If Covid-19 can be transmitted through hand contact and we then touch our nose or rub our eyes I understand that we have opened the door for the virus to enter our body and do it’s worst.  Government advice to wash our hands thoroughly and frequently makes sense.  In Hong Kong in 1974 spitting in public was prohibited and punishable by summary fine. I understand the ban was not because expectoration was considered socially undesirable but for the very sound medical reason that serious diseases could be transmitted through human gob. So why is spitting in public permitted in UK? And why is it that role models, professional footballers in particular, are always framed by the TV cameras, spitting or emptying the contents of their nose on the pitch. The hypocrisy of the same footballers ceasing to shake hands with opponents before the beginning of the game beggars belief.