MANCHESTER: A Pakistani couple in Britain is offering free-of-charge face masks, hand sanitizers and cleaning wipes to the elderly in a bid to help fight the deadly coronavirus.
Elderly locals may either pick up the pack directly from the store or have it delivered to their door by contacting the couple via telephone or Facebook.
Asiyah Javed, who runs the store with husband Jawad Javed, said: “I was out shopping the other day [when] I met this old woman. She was so distressed and was crying because she couldn’t get any sanitiser, tissues or everyday essentials from the supermarket.”
“I feel it is not fair on the elderly — some can’t even get out of their house. Therefore, we decided to make some packs for the elderly for free and for some we even had them delivered to their doors,” she added.
“We are delivering 30 packages to a care home where there are 30 people living, and we’ve got another couple of hundred in the shop. Some people are asking for them to be delivered as they’re old, or disabled, or don’t drive. We are just trying to help people who can’t get out of the house,” she further said.
Her husband chimed in with enthusiasm. “I am delighted that so many people are helping the elderly now. Our goodwill gesture has motivated others and [other] people around the UK are also helping others in this difficult time. Each bag cost us about £2 to put together and we have delivered 500 of them,” he told a media source.
“One of the central principles of Islam is helping others. We have spent a lot of time with our grandparents and we feel that if they were alive, we wouldn’t want them to be struggling,” he further added.
Panic-buying has seen supermarket shelves cleared of items such as toilet paper and painkillers in the several parts of the UK. On online shopping sites like Amazon and eBay, prices of hand sanitizers packets have been hiked by opportunistic sellers reaching up to hundred of pounds each.
