Ethics of knowingly exposing others to infection

petrichor

Suppose Bob has symptoms and suspects he has COVID-19. He decides to get tested. While out and about, he decides to enter a store and pick up some groceries.

How wrong is this?

Suppose someone else gets infected as a result and dies. Or suppose someone just suffers significantly for a couple of weeks. Or suppose someone is financially ruined by the resulting medical bills.

Is Bob responsible? Is he potentially guilty of killing someone?

If I were to punch someone at random in the store, I might well get arrested and charged with a crime. Bob does far more harm, but won't get arrested. I tend to think that if Bob believes himself infected and he exposes others knowing this, he should be held responsible. The consequences are far worse than punching someone. And the infection is likely to spread from those he infects to still more others, maybe hundreds.

Many people have a lax attitude about exposing people to their illness. I've had friends invite me over when they knew they were sick with flu and in at least one case, I got the flu and suffered terribly for two weeks. This "friend" thought nothing of exposing me, the asshole! The result was far worse than if he had punched me. And yet our culture is such that if I get very angry about this, I'm seen as unreasonable.

It's nobody's fault. I didn't get sick or infect you intentionally. The virus did it, not me.

How much less suffering would there be if we all were to automatically quarantine ourselves upon suspecting ourselves of being infected with anything contagious?

schopenhauer1

How much less suffering would there be if we all were to automatically quarantine ourselves upon suspecting ourselves of being infected with anything contagious? — petrichor

I agree with your points mainly but much of this comes down to business practices. People for example, are afraid to be home from work for more than a few days because then they no longer get paid. It's a bit better that everyone's working from home, but this still doesn't change the fact that people won't get paid if they can't actually work, even from home. In general it would be nice if this whole disease helped us realize that people should be allowed many more sick days than they are given.. And that's if they are salaried. If they only work hourly, they even more screwed. So what do we do about this situation? It promotes people taking risky situations, at the cost of others.

Metaphysician Undercover

In many places it's a serious crime if the infection is HIV.

TheDarkElf

↪petrichor

At a base level I completely agree, it seems like a terrible offence and could even be punishable by the death sentence. The issue is that it is (hopefully) completely without malice, they are perhaps trying to care for their family. If someone leaves a rock on a doorstep and many people trip and fall, he person that left the rock isn’t really culpable, even if they did make a grave mistake.

unenlightened

Everyone with symptoms should keep away from the healthy and ring a warning bell and shout "unclean, unclean." whenever anyone gets close. On pain of being stoned to death. It's traditional.

TheMadFool

Suppose Bob has symptoms and suspects he has COVID-19. He decides to get tested. While out and about, he decides to enter a store and pick up some groceries.

How wrong is this? — petrichor

Very wrong and isn't this why we have legally enforced lockdowns in and around infection hotspots? :chin:

Ethics of knowingly exposing others to infection

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