PAPAMOA CHEMIST OUT OF PANADOL BEFORE FORECAST DROPS BELOW 18 DEGREES
The southerly hadn't arrived. The Panadol already had.
A Papamoa chemist sold its last packet of Panadol at 11.47am Tuesday, several hours before a forecast cool change that MetService described as "a bit of weather, really".
The rush began shortly after a Bay of Plenty Times push notification mentioned the word "front". By smoko, the shelf was bare. By lunch, the staff had taped a handwritten sign to the dispensary saying "NO PANADOL. TRY THE NEW WORLD. GOOD LUCK."
Retiree Coral Whitmarsh, 71, said she'd come in for one box and left with none. "I remember in 1974 you could get aspirin off a bloke at the pier for tuppence and he'd throw in a barley sugar. Now I've driven to three chemists and the last one tried to sell me homeopathic willow bark. I told her where she could put the willow."
A second customer, Dean Aporo of Papamoa East, said the queue had stretched past the compression socks and into the fish oil. "Bloke in front of me bought forty-eight Nurofen and a thermometer. It's going to be sixteen degrees, mate. Sixteen."
A pharmacy spokesperson said stock had been ordered and would arrive "Thursday, weather permitting", which several customers noted was the entire problem. They added that paracetamol was also available at every supermarket within a four-minute drive, a fact which appeared to enrage rather than reassure the queue.
By 3pm the forecast had been downgraded to "a bit breezy". The sign remained up. So did Coral, who was now third in line at the Bayfair Unichem and not in the mood to discuss it.
The rush began shortly after a Bay of Plenty Times push notification mentioned the word "front". By smoko, the shelf was bare. By lunch, the staff had taped a handwritten sign to the dispensary saying "NO PANADOL. TRY THE NEW WORLD. GOOD LUCK."
Retiree Coral Whitmarsh, 71, said she'd come in for one box and left with none. "I remember in 1974 you could get aspirin off a bloke at the pier for tuppence and he'd throw in a barley sugar. Now I've driven to three chemists and the last one tried to sell me homeopathic willow bark. I told her where she could put the willow."
A second customer, Dean Aporo of Papamoa East, said the queue had stretched past the compression socks and into the fish oil. "Bloke in front of me bought forty-eight Nurofen and a thermometer. It's going to be sixteen degrees, mate. Sixteen."
A pharmacy spokesperson said stock had been ordered and would arrive "Thursday, weather permitting", which several customers noted was the entire problem. They added that paracetamol was also available at every supermarket within a four-minute drive, a fact which appeared to enrage rather than reassure the queue.
By 3pm the forecast had been downgraded to "a bit breezy". The sign remained up. So did Coral, who was now third in line at the Bayfair Unichem and not in the mood to discuss it.