If you do have mild symptoms, then Dobson recommends trying the following gentle backbends for opening up the lungs and chest. “It’s winter, so we’re cold and tend to huddle ourselves over to protect our organs,” she explains. “This closes everything up and makes us also feel vulnerable and shy. We want to open up our shoulders, open up our lungs.”

Locust pose

Deborah Berryman is a senior yoga teacher with Yoga Alliance Professionals and is a registered mindfulness teacher. She says that the following pose “reproduces the belly-down position doctors recommend for COVID patients, helping to recruit collapsed or poorly utilised lung tissue”.

Begin on your belly with your feet hip distance and your hands reaching back, palms down.
Reach your big toes straight back and press down with all ten toenails to activate your legs.
Keeping your hands lightly on the mat, raise your head, shoulders and chest.
Roll your shoulders back and up away from the floor. Keep the back of your neck long and emphasise lifting your sternum instead of lifting your chin.
To come out of the pose, slowly release.
Repeat three-to-five times if you can, inhaling to lift the torso into extension and exhaling to relax back to the floor or bed.

Seated backbend

Sit down and catch hold of opposite elbows behind your back, drawing the forearms down towards your bum or towards the floor.
If you’re more flexible in your shoulders, you could do the same but interlace your fingers behind your back.

Lying backbend

Roll up a pillow as much as you can and lie down on it so that the long way of the pillow goes in line with your spine.
Lie with soles of feet together, knees wide apart (if comfortable for your hips, alternatively can have legs straight or bent with knees).
Open your arms out wide to a ‘T’ and let your neck relax. She recommends staying in that position for five minutes to really open up the chest and airwaves.

Yoga for Covid: can doing gentle yoga and pilates poses help you feel better?