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"Super spreader" reminds me of the language "super predator" which was used to depict black kids as violent rapists in US media. Edit: Sounds like some good ol

• monadic2 6y ago
  > There might be a few people carelessly running around spreading the virus. There are a few documented cases of this happening early on. Possibly there are some individuals who will do this again in time. How would this invoke less fear than "super spreader"? You just enumerated all the scary things about the phrase.
• giardini 6y ago
  It is a broad brush used to paint fear into the population. Anyone could be a superspreader so you must act as if all people are. Why? b/c you don't know who's a "superspreader". Yes panic, now! The article defines a superspreader, but the definition isn't useful: >"a generic term for an unusually contagious individual who’s been infected with disease. In the context of the coronavirus, scientists haven’t narrowed down how many infections someone needs to cause to qualify as a superspreader, but generally speaking it far exceeds the two to three individuals researchers initially estimated the average infected patient could infect." Hmm, so granny kisses 2 grandchildren, she's not a superspreader but if she kisses 3, watch out! Pretty vague definition here. Later the article states: >"What makes someone a superspreader? We don’t yet know what it is about the biology of some people that causes them to be superspreaders. It might have something to do with increased viral loads and shedding more virus than is normal, but we still don’t know what would trigger this, let alone how to identify it through practical means."< So it's a term they haven't established a definition for yet, a term for people they cannot identify, and, most of all, it is useless not only for epidemiologists' demonstrably invalid models which did not work before and continue to not work, nor is it useful for anyone else except scaremongers. This article is beneath MIT. Shame!
  • thomaslord 6y ago
    This is a long-used term that isn't specific to COVID-19, which describes a legitimate medical phenomenon with a wide historical basis. Ever head of Typhoid Mary? She was a superspreader. Interestingly, people who claim everything about COVID-19 is a conspiracy by the media (or the elites, or whoever) to control the populace with fear are significantly more likely to be superspreaders. Why? Because all the simple, moderately-inconvenient precautions they refuse to take legitimately do slow the spread of the disease. Someone who frequently goes within 6 feet of other people while not wearing a mask and leaves their home more frequently than necessary has a much higher chance of getting the disease, a much higher chance of transmitting the disease to each person they come into contact with while contagious, and also a much higher number of contacts to potentially infect. The term is actually incredibly useful, even on an individual level - if I'm considering who I'm willing to interact with, someone who's come into close contact with 500 people in the past week while not wearing a mask is significantly more dangerous to me and my loved ones than someone who has come into contact with 50 people at a distance of 6 feet or more while wearing a mask.
    • giardini 6y ago
      "You talkin' to me, huh, you talkin to me?" Because I already know all that hot air. But in the context of the article we're all superspreaders or we're NOT all superspreaders and they don't explain (nor CAN they explain) the difference b/c THEY DON'T KNOW! Yes, of course "superspreader" means something within the confines of social diseases or slow spread. But today, in the context of Covid-19 it has lost any distinction from "carrier" or "infected". But most importantly a term that is undefined or poorly defined brings no new information to the table. Possibly for a good reason: covid-19 is very contagious, so contagious that everyone indeed may be a "superspreader". But if so, what new does that reveal, what does it tell you that is useful and not already known? How does it help do the math? How would it change how the powers-that-be model? Would they model CovId-19 and AIDS with different math? Thanks to crappy stats, crappy science and a crappy pseudo-science (epidemiology) that works with models that don't apply this is (unfortunately ) one more useless term. This has nothing to do with conspiracy theories and is merely the "superspreading" of yet more fear by fearmongering media and individuals. This has nothing to do with people who don't take the same precautions you do. thomaslord says> "The term is actually incredibly useful..." For what? No one, not even a moron, needs the term "superspreader" to know to avoid someone who interacts daily with many ill people or "who's come into close contact with 500 people in the past week while not wearing a mask". Using the term is fearmongering that adds no information to the situation. Not that there is much information to begin with - all authorities and "experts" can do is count illnesses and count deaths (and they _still_ aren't doing that very well).