Cr Watson's motion requires council to prepare a response to a possible coronavirus pandemic in the Shoalhaven and includes that "air conditioning and the close work environment may aid in the spread of the disease" and among other things, calls for the "possible closure of public air conditioned buildings".

When asked, Watson said he didn't need to seek any advice from NSW Health or health professionals before he drafted his motion.

"No, medical experts have got nothing to do with running sewerage schemes or working out how we deploy our staff," he said.

"This is just a basic framework to get the CEO preparing the plan, as he delves into it more he will make the final decisions."

University of NSW Professor Marylouise McLaws, an infection control expert and World Health Organisation adviser said there was no evidence so far COVID-19 could be spread through air conditioning.

"Generally SARS and we believe this virus, is spread by droplets which are larger size particles," Professor McLaws said.

She said the droplets were in fact heavier than the flu and to her knowledge, there had never been a cluster of flu outbreaks caused by air conditioning.

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She also said it was misleading to include air conditioning in COVID-19 control methods.

"The science is new and the science of infection control can be very confusing," she said.

"Given that we tell people that it's spread by coughing, doesn't mean that those particles can get into air conditioning and be spread around.

"We do infection prevention according to the current science that we have, and we don't believe we need to be concerned about air conditioning."

Regardless, Cr Watson said it was a "no-brainier" air conditioners could spread the virus.

"It's well known that air conditioning potentially spreads viruses," he said.

Professor McLaws said it was particularly important with coronavirus that there is "a systematic and consistent message".

"As you've noticed with panic buying, it can cause a lot of stress," she said.

"So by doing something out of the ordinary, it could, instead of being considered to be very helpful, actually backfire and make people very anxious."

Cr Annette Alldrick was one of three councillors who voted against the motion. She said council needs to be advised by experts before putting forward a motion on coronavirus.

"As a nurse, I'm not an expert in coronavirus and neither is Councillor Watson and because of that I take my advice from the Ministry of Health and the Local Health District," Cr Alldrick said.

"I actually did put an alternative motion, that we take advice from the Ministry of Health and the Public Health Unit before coming up with any sort of policy on how we're going to deal with the coronavirus.

"It's the same with his bushfire motion. It's not based on any evidence or science and we should be firstly listening to the evidence and the science before we come up with a motion to deal with something like that."