Worried about Ebola? Got $34.95? Ebola-C may be for you.
TMZ reports a New York businessman named Todd Spinelli created Ebola-C, a wafer containing 554 percent of the recommended daily allowance of vitamin C that hit the marked October 1st, to “help boost the immune system to protect it from contracting diseases, including Ebola.”
The product is not FDA approved, but Spinelli does have the seal of approval of a doctor on his staff.
There is no evidence vitamin C helps the body fight off Ebola, but that hasn’t stopped Spinelli from selling up to 14,000 packages of the product modeled after the anti-cold product Emergen-C. At $34.95 per package, that’s nearly $500,000 per day.
Spinelli is hardly alone when it comes to making money off Ebola fears. The beauty of capitalism is everything presents an opportunity to someone.
Jon Schultz owns the domain ebola.com, but he’s willing to sell it…for $150,000.
A search of Ebola on Amazon turns up a lot of books on the virus, as you’d expect, but it also offers up hazmat suits. Lot’s of hazmat suits. And respirators.
Situations like the Ebola outbreak always excite the entrepreneurial spirit in a free society, the anthrax attacks in the early 2000s let to the sale of “biological attack survival kits.”
EBay, the online auction house, has hazmat suits and respirators, but it also offers “lighter” options.
Want an “Ebola” bumper sticker modeled after President Barack Obama’s campaign bumper sticker? For $5 it’s yours. Looking for a button marking the death of Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person to die in the United States of Ebola? You can bid on one.
Funny T-shirts are popping up all over the place. Want one that says “Ask me about Ebola” that has a gas mask on it when you pull the hem over your head? Amazon has you covered. Need one that says “I Heart Ebola” with the shape of the state Texas in place of the heart? Well, eBay has your back.
If you’re in the market for someone for the kids, there’s always the plush Ebola virus from the stuffed “Giant Microbes” collection. You can buy one for $75, or bid on the one that currently stands at $37 with 13 bids.
Ahh, capitalism.