People all around the world have one thing in common besides the potential exposure to the new emerging novel pathogen, best know as simply the coronavirus, or designated as SARS-CoV-2 by officials, with the clinical illness called COVID-19, finding empty shelves at their local supermarket.

The image is internationally the same, markets running out of toilet paper, hand sanitizer, disinfectants, and durable food items. Perhaps the real surprise here is why some people are surprised about it from happening.

The people who ignore, or are to poor to plan in advance may later be required to visit public food banks, services like soup shelters, currently serving the homeless, or ideally require food deliveries. The home stock piling of food situation is a huge logistical challenge, threatens quarantine measures.

In the U.K. supermarkets just now announced rationing, after many begun stockpiling, this could have been put in place much earlier.

Expect Panic Buys

Panic buying is exactly what you get if there is an imminent need to potentially be quarantined at home due to infection, or to suddenly work from home, and the need to be prepared for this is not stressed enough, or at all, in advance.

The German Interior Ministry for instance advises to store enough food to last for 10 days, because initially a disaster might put national emergency services beyond reach. And how this plays out everybody can see currently in China, millions of people quarantined in their homes.

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Future Food Scarcity will be Different

With increasing temperatures, more extreme weather scenario’s, sea level rise, we can expect heavy effects for food producing regions in the world, which attacks our food supply at the origin, making the current situation look easily solvable, because now we can still grow enough to supply the demand.

The NATO already warned their members of coming food and water shortages back in 2017, Climate State reported.