Things only get serious when Asian women start panicking and clean out the cash and carries.

There is something quite unique about a panic when it concerns Asian women. Much of it is based on rumours and this idea that they know something other people don’t.

I single out Asian women because it is quite clear….in fact let us not beat around the bush here…it is obvious this panic has been orchestrated by the women.

Last week when everyone else was buying toilet rolls and hand washes we were laughing at them. ‘Look at us…we use a lota’, some of us would exclaim and send messages out to each other boasting about how we cleaned ourselves with water and had no real need for toilet paper. We ridiculed those involved in the ensuing panic and asked ‘who ate pasta anyway?’.

Others boasted that they cleaned their hands regularly for religious reasons five times a day and these ‘medieval goray’ had just figured out keeping themselves pure was important.

It would, and excuse the pun come to bite them in the *rse sooner or later.

A week on and it is only a true panic when the atta (flour) and rice starts running out. We can do without many things in our lives but take the atta and rice away from us and we are helpless.

The thing about 'atta and rice' is that it unites all communities…Pakistani, Indian and Bangladeshi.

This weekend I witnessed people cleaning out their local grocers. They then decided to take on the larger cash and carries. And if that wasn’t enough we did that thing we never really do until the shi* has hit the fan – we decided to buy the rice and atta from Tesco and Asda.

All of a sudden we have men driving their wives and mums around to every single shop and being told to spread out to make sure we get what’s left.

In addition to this we there are the rumours. Now, these rumours are no ordinary Twitter rumours that we read about every day. These are the ones based on complete and utter nonsense where the source is normally some woman massi (aunties) who heard it from another massi.

Thanks to our network of extended families we can clean out several cash and carries of necessary goods in hours. Each large family will have one person dictating the buying for all members and will end up fuelling further panic by sharing the false news with other friends.

We don’t want to check the rumours we want simply to act on them.

There are those who will scoff at this piece and many women will no doubt be offended that we blamed the massi for the lack of atta and flour. But anyone else got any ideas?