Coronavirus: Makeshift masks and plastic bottles used for protection as stocks run low

As surgical mask supplies run low in China, shoppers panic-buy remaining stock and resort to making their own.

Chinese children wear plastic bottles as makeshift homemade protection and protective masks while waiting to check in to a flight at Beijing Capital Airport in Beijing. Picture: Kevin Frayer/Getty

Images have circulated around the world of thousands of people rushing to get surgical masks as the WHO declares coronavirus a global emergency.

With the death toll now 213, and more than 9320 infected with the disease — 98 of them outside China — mask stocks are running low, or non-existent — in some areas.

It’s left many desperate to protect themselves using everything from garbage bags and ski goggles to motorbike helmets and cut-down plastic water cooler bottles — despite the fact the methods are far less effective.

A woman was spotted at Vancouver airport on January 28 wearing a surgical mask and a large plastic bottle on her head.

Images of people wearing bottles on their heads have been circulating for days, with two people in Hong Kong snapped wearing the plastic protectors, while another man was tweeted wearing a bottle on his head in a Jinyintan Hospital near the epicentre in Wuhan.

今天见了几个武汉当地的市民朋友，他们带我去了金银潭医院，只是在外面跟医生聊了聊，没办法深入医院。但是武汉人的乐观和坚定真的是震撼到了我！他们勇敢、自信、热爱生活、苦中作乐~ pic.twitter.com/dsuQ8YkwaE

— 陈秋实（陳秋實） (@chenqiushi404) January 25, 2020

Surgical masks contain an important moisture-barrier which protects the wearer. Dust masks do not protect the wearer.

The means by which the Coronavirus spreads is as yet unknown, but one likely form is through droplets from an infected person’s cough.

People queue at a pharmacy to by protective face masks, thermometers and hand sanitiser in Singapore, where there are so far seven confirmed cases of the coronavirus. Picture: Roslan Rahman/AFP

Amazon and Alibaba report many stockists of the antiviral masks had run out by Wednesday and people have reportedly lined up for hours across China, Hong Kong and Singapore in search of the masks.

Shops in Australia are reportedly running low.

Mask factories in China and overseas are ramping up production to meet demand caused by the viral outbreak.

A Thai surgical mask factory, producing 10 million masks a month, has increased working hours to cope with the rising demand. Picture: Jonathan Klein/AFP