Deliveries for the aged and drive-through groceries in Durban

Two Durban men have pledged to help the elderly with their shopping during the Covid-19 lockdown.

Ahmed, who wanted to be identified by that name only, and his colleague, Aslam, have started a WhatsApp group to help the elderly get in contact with volunteers who will go out to pick up their medicine and buy them groceries and other essentials.

“My colleague and I realised that there are going to be a lot of elderly people from Friday who are going to want to get basic things and that's why we created a group,” said Ahmed.

Ahmed said people in the Musgrave, Morningside, Overport and Asherville areas could contact him if they were willing to volunteer and they would be put in contact with an elderly person looking to get essential goods during the lockdown.

“At the moment there have been a lot of requests for help and we are trying to keep it simple and on a small scale. We are fortunate that when compared with our request for help, we have received double the number of volunteers,” he said.

Meanwhile, a KwaZulu-Natal supermarket will be bringing groceries out to customers' cars during the lockdown.

“The customers call with what they require, we box it up and bring it to their car and they don't have to come into the store,” said Checkstar Phoenix manager Shane Chetty.

Chetty said they had received an influx of customers following the president's announcement of a lockdown and had been limiting the number of people allowed into the store to 100 at a time.

“It's been extremely busy since last week and we have tried to maintain food on the shelves - which was not easy, but we have been able to maintain it thus far. Over these past three days after the president's speech, we have been very busy. People have attempted to panic buy, but we have limited the number of things they can buy to six per item,” he said.

Customers will also be able to call the store and have their items delivered to them, he added.