Covid-19: Empty shelves in Japan as people panic buy toilet rolls

Tough times ahead for Japan.

Nyi Nyi Thet | February 28, 2020, 05:22 PM

Japan is in the midst of a Covid-19 outbreak. There are currently over 200 cases in Japan, with four deaths reported.

Streets have been emptier since a few weeks back, and the latest round of infections has not done anything to ease tensions over the virus.

6,000 masks were stolen from a hospital, and a fight broke out recently over alleged queue cutting for masks.

The next thing on panic buyer's lists? Toilet rolls.

Here are some pictures of empty shelves as toilet rolls in Japan were snapped up.

Supermarts in places like Shinjuku, Saitama, and more have seen their toilet roll stocks absolutely decimated.

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And like all panic buying anywhere in the world, the goods eventually end up online.

In many ways, this is the situation that Hong Kong faced a few weeks back:

That panic was stirred by online rumours that toilet paper supply will be cut off due to the worsening Covid-19 situation in China.

This appears to also be the case in Japan.

According to Mainichi, these false rumours consisted of a variety of unsubstantiated claims.

A Japanese paper association representative had this to say: "None of the member companies have run out of such (paper) products. Even if they temporarily disappear from store shelves, they can be replenished quickly."

Image from Lionel Piquet and LuneRune

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