We have no conflicts of interest to disclose.Dear Editor,We read, with great interest, the article by Romeu‐Labayen ‘Spanish nurses’ experiences with personal protective equipment and perceptions of risk of contagion from COVID‐19’ (Romeu‐Labayen et al., 2021). As medical students in the United Kingdom (UK), we would like to share our experiences of personal protective equipment (PPE) shortages and highlight how the issues expressed in the paper were felt beyond the nursing community.We thank the authors for highlighting nurses’ experience on the lack of PPE, particularly as we echo many of the sentiments expressed. We too struggled to obtain adequate PPE and oftentimes had to justify our needs. We, therefore, share the nurses’ perspective of feeling less protected than senior colleagues and, in addition, were left feeling that our learning needs and roles were not valued. Furthermore, as was the case in Spain, the guidance on the types of PPE required was consistently changing in the UK. This was often not communicated to healthcare students, which left us feeling confused, unsupported, and as though our safety was not a priority, views shared by our nursing colleagues. As such, this demonstrates that issues with PPE and lack of support were felt by healthcare workers and students alike. Additionally, we too had a high level of perceived risk of clinical areas and experienced misinformation and mistrust of seniors as we were given contradictory information on PPE use. These issues occurred across the globe and also beyond the first wave, which highlights that the lack of proper understanding of safety protocols and spread of misinformation was widespread, systemic and prolonged.An important issue, which was not fully explored by the authors, was the insufficient provision of training on the safe use of PPE. In England, the National Health Service advised all organisations to train healthcare workers in the use of PPE (NHS England & NHS Improvement, 2020). Despite this, PPE training was not effectively provided to healthcare students, with many of us receiving inadequate or delayed training. Importantly, this issue has been shown to lead to increased COVID‐19‐related anxiety and negative mental health outcomes, which in turn has previously been linked to higher risks of infection among healthcare professionals (Lee et al., 2018). As such, providing healthcare workers with sufficient training is of utmost importance.It becomes apparent that adverse effects related to issues with PPE extended beyond doctors and nurses, and greatly affected healthcare students as well. The Medical Schools Council in the UK designated medical students as ‘essential workers’, thereby classifying our teaching and supervision on clinical placements as essential work (Medical Schools Council, 2020). However, the lack of PPE did not reflect this, as it greatly restricted our learning opportunities and clinical exposure, thereby having a detrimental effect on our professional development. Furthermore, not being provided with adequate protection and having to justify our need for PPE suggests a hierarchy exists in the medical system, as highlighted by the authors. It appears as though some members of the healthcare team were being uniquely disadvantaged due to being perceived as less critical, and that efforts to save PPE superseded us meeting our learning requirements. Whilst we acknowledge that our involvement in assisting with direct clinical duties is more limited than that of qualified healthcare professionals, our exposure to the clinical environment is critical in preparing us to enter the workplace and, as such, must not be impacted by PPE availability. Ultimately, as healthcare students, we present a powerful reserve for future pandemics. We strongly believe that all members of the team, medical and nursing students included must therefore feel valued and be regarded equally with respect to safety.Fortunately, the initial difficulties surrounding PPE and its distribution appear to have mostly settled. However, recognising and addressing the initial difficulties experienced with PPE remains important, particularly as PPE is still commonplace, and future crises are possible. We believe that the viewpoint of different healthcare professionals is essential, and we hope that exploring our experiences with PPE will encourage reflection, and for these issues and inequalities to be addressed.