As a shortage of face masks continues in Japan amid the spread of the new coronavirus originating in China, their prices are shooting up on online flea markets.

Some people are apparently cornering masks at drugstores and other shops and selling them at excessively high prices via online markets that have no regulations regarding resales.

As the coronavirus outbreak drags on, Amazon.com has run out its inventory of regularly priced masks.

In the meantime, large volumes of masks are on sale elsewhere at inflated prices. For example, a pack of seven masks that normally sells for around ¥400 is priced at about ¥4,000 on one such website.

Visiting a drugstore in the city of Osaka, a female corporate worker in her 20s said, “I’m now visiting a fifth store for a pack containing a large number of individually wrapped masks, but I can’t find them anywhere.”