A new trend came into the limelight while India is under complete lockdown due to Coronavirus. People are not only stocking food, groceries, and essential items; they are also stocking packs of condoms and other birth control products.
Vishal Joshi, a medicos owner in South Mumbai, gave the statement, “The percentage of females buying condoms is more than men. Many housewives are also asking for condoms. There is an increase of 15% in sales. Apart from condoms, the sale of emergency contraceptive pills, which otherwise is quite low, has also shown an increase during this time. This kind of demand is unforeseen. Never in my life did I think that a virus would increase the sales of contraceptive products.”
There has been an increase in sales by 25-50% in the last week itself, and the pharmacists are actually increasing the stock of condoms to meet the demand. The primary reason for the spike in demand can be attributed to the complete shutdown of the country, including recreational places like bars, restaurants even gyms, which gives couples a lot of time to spend together.
Harshal Shah, a medical shop owner in South Mumbai, said, “People now have a lot of time, and they are bored at home. Generally, people prefer smaller packs, but the demand for bigger packs has seen a huge boost. People usually prefer buying a pack of three, but in the last week most of them have purchased packs of 10 and 20.”
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The increase in sales has also been reported in Gurugram and Delhi. A Medical shop employee of Apollo in DLF said, “There has been an increase in the sale of condoms and other birth control products. The demand is superseding the supply.” Same was the claim of Suresh from Isha Medicos, “There is a noticeable increase in the sale of condoms since the time of the shutting down of offices and markets.”
Apart from the increase in contraceptive sales, there has been an increase in the purchase of Sex Toys by 10-15% within a week. An online store owner said that he had experienced a significant hike in demand around Janta Curfew, but the delivery will be delayed due to lockdown.
Even the adult site, PornHub shared their data and said there had been an increase in viewership to 11.6%. Earlier around 120 million used to visit their website per day, and now 134million people are visiting. Especially after the free subscription given to Italy, France and Spain, there has been an exponential hike. They have recently introduced a section Covid-19 content where there are videos of people having sex with a mask on which has become the most popular segment.
