Panic buying?

It looks like we're seeing 30% more infections each day. That's doubling in three days. The UK count is 206 now, that would mean 200,000 in a month, and the whole country in two months. Except those of us who are lucky, or careful.

So that's my forecast - this will get bigger and bigger for a month or two, with 3 or 4% deaths, so a total of between one and two million deaths by the end of the year.

The best way to stay uninfected, is hand hygiene.

I hear that you can't get hand sanitiser in the supermarket.

No surprise there. What happened was, people bought all they could for resale at thrice the price on eBay. The usual suppliers have run out.

A few years ago, I bought 10 liters of antibacterial alcohol on eBay - I got it really cheap. It's "hospital grade", and I got it for cleaning computers, keyboards and screens, plus to clean my hands while I'm out caching. Which means that I now have about 8 liters of this. I pour a small amount into a 50 ml container, and carry it while I'm out. I also use it in a small atomiser. We went shopping today, and I sprayed the shopping trolley handles before using it. You might call that paranoid, but the cost is very very low, just a quick pshhsht.

I also went onto eBay and bought some sanitiser gel, in bottles of half a liter. Again, I fill my small bottle from that, for use while I'm out.

Soap - no problem. I already had a cupboard full of soap, given to me by various hotels and suchlike. Plus I got several liters of ladysolly's special (and horribly expensive) olive oil soap, she says it's good for her hands.

When Brexit was looming last year, we bought an extra pack of loo rolls every time we shopped, and we're still working our way through those - when those run out, there's always the Times.

No.

If there is going to be a problem, it will be food. If we can't get food from the supermarket, we're stuffed. But I'm sure that our government has thught of that, and I can tell you what the answer is.

Rationing.

They can't talk about it yet, because that really would trigger panic buying, but it would be an unthinking government that wasn't already planning for food rationing. Because that's the only way to get fair shares for all.

If this crisis only lasts for six months, I think I'll be OK - I have about 40 pounds of fat that I can draw on, so I can survive on a very low calorie diet.