By Nimra Shaikh
Locals are distraught as leading supermarkets such as Sainsbury’s and Tesco have empty aisles with very few household items available to purchase.
The coronavirus has caused a panic all over the globe, and this has left many stores with some empty shelves and dwindling supplies of cleaning products, toilet tissue rolls and many other necessary items. Staple food items such as baked beans and pasta are also gone, or in short supply.
Jaklyn Riley, Sales Assistant at Dorothy Perkins came to Sainsbury’s to get sanitary pads. “I think people need to be considerate towards others. I mean, what am I supposed to do now, put a towel down? These are my monthly needed supplies and I can’t find them anywhere.
“I have been to Boots, Tesco and Superdrug’s to look for pads but all shelves are empty.”
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the UK has climbed to 1,543 and the UK death toll is 55 as of Tuesday morning, according to government statistics. As the threat of lockdown looms, UK supermarkets have begun to ration their stock, leading to empty aisles.
Mike Coupe, Sainsbury’s Chief Executive, sent an email earlier this week to all customers, saying that due to “ongoing uncertainty around the full impact of Coronavirus” that their stores are much busier than normal, with some empty shelves.
“I wanted to personally reassure you that we have more food and other essential items coming to us from manufacturers and into our warehouses and distribution centres,” he wrote. “If we all shop just for the food that we and our families need, there will be enough for everyone.”
Steps his stores have taken to ensure that food supplies remain available include setting limits on items such as pain relief and cleaning supplies, and ordering more items from warehouses and increasing their capacity
Many customers are very frustrated with daily necessities being out of stock. Some have had to travel to other stores, which was frustrating as they were also empty.
“It is really worrying because people like us cannot go out,” said pensioner Parveen Shah. “It is very vulnerable for us to catch the disease, people have lost their mind the way they are shopping and they should have sympathy towards elderly people in every sense.”
Some chains such as Iceland have suggested opening early so pensioners can shop for an hour when the store is practically empty to avoid contact with others.
And some larger supermarkets, such as Tesco in Colney Hatch, north London, have announced they will close earlier in the evenings to stock up aisles.
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