Hyderabad: The dreaded coronavirus, which has the entire country on tenterhooks, has triggered a panic buying of protective facemasks in the city. More specifically, people are keen to buy the N95 facemasks, whose stocks are not reaching the city currently.
While one mask costs around Rs 150, all stocks in the city have been exhausted, say medical apparatus sellers in the city. Most of these masks stocks, ironically, are manufactured in China and apparatus traders and businessmen have ceased all imports from there. “The N95 facemask variants are imported by us. However, we are not getting any supply of these masks now. We only have surgical masks available,” said a representative of Amar Surgicals in the city.
Similarly, even experts from medical device associations say that sales of these masks have gone through the roof.
