Stockpilers pushing trolleys piled high with toilet rolls form enormous queues at Costco while shelves are stripped empty in Asda in coronavirus panic
- Shoppers at Costco in Chingford seen forming huge queues at the checkout
- Lee Kennedy, who took video, said people were seen ‘fighting’ over toilet rolls
- A separate clip shows shelves in Asda supermarket in Sutton, Surrey, left bare
Shocking footage has emerged of frantic stockpilers pushing trolleys piled high with toilet rolls and forming huge queues at Costco.
A video shows checkouts flooded with shoppers at the wholesale warehouse chain near Chingford, London, amid panic over the coronavirus outbreak.
The store was said to be ‘running short’ on water with shoppers ‘fighting’ over toilet rolls and being ‘limited’ to one each.
Shocking footage shows shoppers with trolleys stockpiled high with toilet rolls flooding checkouts at the Costco store in Chingford, London
Lee Kennedy, who filmed the footage of stockpilers in Costco, said: ‘It was all very over the top, people were fighting over toilet rolls and being limited to one per person. They were talking about putting restrictions on the bottled water as well.’
He added: ‘There were hardly any toilet rolls left and the water was running short.
‘The queues were sneaking around the aisles and people were arguing about pushing in front of each other.
‘It was okay, very hectic in there. One worker said it was worse than Christmas.’
A separate clip shows shelves in an Asda supermarket in Sutton, Surrey, stripped bare.
The video was posted onto a Facebook group, captioned: ‘Where has all the food, toilet paper and water gone?’
It comes as a grandfather in his 80s became the second person who died from coronavirus on British soil yesterday.
A woman in her 70s was the first UK victim after being diagnosed with coronavirus while at the Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading.
A separate clip shows shelves in Asda in Sutton, Surrey, stripped bare. It comes as a grandfather in his 80s was the second person who died from coronavirus on UK soil yesterday
The woman – who had ‘underlying health conditions’ – tested positive for the killer infection on Wednesday before succumbing to the illness the following day.
Elderly people are to be told to stay at home under new government guidelines to tackle the outbreak of the virus as health officials urge Britons to check in on their relatives.
The elderly should be prepared for ‘social distancing’ policies, which are to be announcement by ministers next week, government sources said.
Advice will include the elderly staying at home and avoiding crowded areas which the Department of Health warned could leave people ‘cut off’.
Guidelines also state that households should decide how their food will be delivered in case they have to self-isolate.
In total, 164 people in the UK have tested positive for coronavirus, up from 115 cases reported at the same time on Thursday as Norther Ireland confirmed its fourth case on Friday evening.
The Government revealed its four-stage plan earlier this week that includes a raft of socially and economically costly contingency moves as a last resort.
The 28-page ‘action plan’ was agreed at the first emergency Cobra meeting to be chaired by the PM on Monday in which it was explained there are four stages – contain, delay, research and mitigate – to dealing with the virus.
MailOnline has contacted Costco for comment.