If you’ve been to a grocery store lately, you’ve most definitely experienced the phenomenon of panic-buying.
People are literally emptying supermarket shelves to prepare for a nation-wide lockdown to combat the coronavirus , and while this may provide them with some peace of mind, it’s also depriving others of essential items that are no longer available in stores.
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Last weekend, mom-of-four Lauren Whitney was already feeling the stress when she realized she needed to hit the store.
She hadn’t come to her Washington, Utah Walmart looking to stock up like the rest of the shoppers.
All she needed were diapers for her 18-month-old daughter, but there were none in sight.
“I think it was the straw that broke the camel’s back for the week,” Lauren told TODAY . “And my emotions kind of bubbled up and I was like, ‘Somebody needs to hear this.'”
Lauren pulled out her phone and filmed an emotional video on the social sharing app, Tik Tok.
“To all you crazy people buying out the diapers,” she tearfully began the clip as she quickly showed rows of empty shelves in the diaper aisle, “How am I supposed to diaper my child?”
The video quickly went viral. It currently has over 900,000 likes and more than 5 million views.
As Lauren told Buzzfeed News, “I took the video intending to keep it in my drafts, but accidentally uploaded it and logged on an hour later to see it went viral. I debated taking it down, but decided it needed to be seen.”
Lauren said her family can’t afford to bulk-buy like many people in the country are doing.
Her husband is ex-military and is now a full-time student. She works part-time at a movie theater in an effort to support her family.
“There’s so many people out there like myself that we, we don’t get paid very much,” she explained.
“So, you know, we’re low income families and so it’s hard for us to be able to just go out and buy a large amount of things at one time.”
What’s even more frustrating is when the family *does* have money to buy products, Lauren said they’re not on the shelves anymore.
“So those people that are buying in bulk or that are clearing the shelves make it harder for those of us that either are low income or only get paid every two weeks or even once a month,” she explained.
The Tik Tok video’s comments are filled with plenty of sympathizers, but some people were indifferent to Lauren’s situation.
Many users actually told the mom to “calm down”, and accused her of overreacting.
“People saying things like, ‘Don’t have children if you can’t afford them’ or ‘why are you crying? This is nothing to cry about’,” she told TODAY .
But there were even more people who filled the comments with words of support.
Concerned users reached out to Lauren to see if they could help at all, with some even offering to send the family some diapers and even some money.
“I had to respond to every single one saying, ‘Hey, we’re fine. We’re okay. I was able to find some,’ but it’s so wonderful to see all the positive comments,” she said.
At the end of the day, Lauren just hopes her viral video will open other people’s eyes to the consequences of their panic-buying actions.
She told TODAY that her goal is for people to just “stop and think that there are other families out there that might also need things.”
She left those exhbiting this behavior with one final thought.
She added, “I just hope that people can understand that by purchasing 10 or 20 boxes at a time, it leaves nothing for those of us that can’t do that.”
h/t: TODAY
