Got out of the house for a little while today, went to Costco. Outside was a queue, with good “social spacing” being reminded by the team of cart-wranglers who were sanitizing all the carts (particularly the push bar). They were letting people in in groups as people came out. Inside was not at all crowded – easy to keep spaced out, and 2/3 or maybe 3/4 of the people wore masks. Most of the employees didn’t.
They had toilet paper back in stock, and LOTS of water – many pallets of bottled water. Only out of a few things, like wipes, pure alcohol, but supplies of others items was much slimmer than normal. Fewer brands and types of dogfood. Only a couple of types of rice, and not as many feet of shelf-space for it. A thinner selection of chips and snack foods. lesser selection of fresh items, and a modest stock. They had eggs, but fewer than normally. The bread aisle was looking pretty well picked over. Flour, sugar, and staples like that were present, but with not a lot of shelf-space or variety. Didn’t see any canned soup. Chicken was in short supply, but most other meats appeared well stocked. Figured I’d try a hunk of farmed halibut (first time I ever saw it was last trip; didn’t even know it existed) and see if it was OK, or as inferior to wild halibut as farmed salmon is to wild-caught. (having grown up in Alaska, and worked on a salmon trawler, I am a little bit particular on my fish).
So variety and excess stock was low, but obviously there were not the bare shelves of Venezuela and imminent starvation. It was in some ways a local experience of this background writeup:
It was a “new normal,” but I doubt it will last for more than a month or two, as the field trials an anecdotal evidence supporting the Trump Cocktail of meds (hydroxychloroquine +z-pak/Azithromycin+ zinc, preferably with a large twist of vitamin C and D3) as a cure, or at least a treatment to significantly reduce the severity of the infection of the Wuhan Flu, Covid19.