Can a chest HRCT-based crash course on COVID-19 cases make inexperienced thoracic radiologists readily available to face the next pandemic?

•After the "crash course", chest HRCT-naïve readers were comparable to a thoracic radiologist in assessing COVID-19 extent.•After the course, readers agreed with the experienced reader at a moderate-to-excellent level on additional HRCT features.•Chest HRCT-naïve readers can be readily made available for facing the high burden of HRCTs required in an epidemic.