The supply of face masks has also been strained. The US government has recommended people stop buying them – not only because surgical masks aren’t sufficient protection from Covid-19, but because there may not be enough for healthcare professionals who need them to do their jobs.

The fact that supply-chain juggernaut China is at the centre of the spread of coronavirus has exacerbated panic buying, says Ben Oppenheim, senior director at San Francisco-based infectious disease research firm Metabiota.

“A lot of the narrative has focused on the disruption of global production and supply chains. There's uncertainty about whether we'll see shortages in medicines, masks and other consumables, and that uncertainty needs to get clarified and addressed,” he says.

The psychology of panic buying

There’s a clear difference between disaster preparation and panic buying, says Taylor.

In the case of a hurricane or flood, most people have a fair idea of the items they may need in the event of a blackout or a water shortage. But since it’s unclear at this stage just what effects Covid-19 will have, there’s a lot of uncertainty driving this spending.

Panic buying, Taylor says, is fuelled by anxiety, and a willingness to go to lengths to quell those fears: like queueing for hours or buying way more than you need.

We’ve seen this before throughout history. Back in 1962 during the Cuban missile crisis, when nuclear war seemed imminent, American families filled their basements with enough canned goods and bottled water to survive an atomic blast.

Then there was Y2K at the turn of the millennium. Amid fears that a catastrophic glitch when computers’ internal clocks reset to “00” for the year 2000 could crash global markets or send missiles flying, people didn’t just hoard lots of nonperishables and bottled water, but money, too – in 1999, the US Treasury was ordered to print an extra $50bn in the expectation that people would withdraw and stockpile cash.

Panic buying helps people feel in control of the situation, experts say.

“Under circumstances like these, people feel the need to do something that’s proportionate to what they perceive is the level of the crisis,” Taylor says. “We know that washing your hands and practicing coughing hygiene is all you need to do at this point.

“But for many people, hand-washing seems to be too ordinary. This is a dramatic event, therefore a dramatic response is required, so that leads to people throwing money at things in hopes of protecting themselves.”