Mask fever breaks out before bug

The threat of the coronavirus hitting the nation’s largest city brought a touch of Halloween to February: Everybody’s looking for a mask.

Finding one is another thing entirely, with shoppers frantically hunting for the protective N-95 respirator masks that were reported sold out at stores around the boroughs.

“It’s ridiculous,” said one local shopper while eyeing an empty shelf at Home Depot in Woodside, Queens. “They really should keep them stocked with everything that’s happening.”

Nervous New Yorkers descended on the store even without a single reported case of the virus in the five boroughs or anywhere else in the state. Business owners were scrambling to keep up with the sudden demand, but the masks were extraordinarily difficult to find.

“I got the Chinese guys, they’re calling and they want, like, 15 or 20 boxes,” said Gus Bakatsias of Angelo Paint Corp. in Jamaica. “One guy was from a pharmacy, and he was planning to resell them down in Flushing or something.”

The businessman said his suppliers won’t get any new shipments of the hot-selling masks until sometime in April. His business is receiving “three or four” calls a day from customers seeking the coverups.

“Don’t bother looking because nobody has it for at least two months,” said Bakatsias. “They’re not even taking orders until they get them into the warehouse.”

The masks protect the wearer from liquid and airborne particles that can contaminate people through sneezing and coughing.

The NYPD was better prepared than the average New Yorker for any potential coronavirus outbreak.

“We are giving out thousands upon thousands of gloves, masks and wipes throughout patrol, housing,” said NYPD Chief of Department Terence Monahan. “Transit has it too. We’ve put out disinfectant to each command.

“We are prepared if and when it hits the city.”

Metropolitan Transportation Authority Chairman Patrick Foye declined to say Wednesday if the agency has an emergency plan to manage coronavirus in the city’s public transit systems, which are used by some 10 million people a day.

“We will deal with that as the occasion arises,” Foye said, adding that the agency has “increased the supplies, the stores of masks and other materials” since the virus became a global health threat.