Giuliani and Ingraham are acting particularly idiotic, but I suspect that few people are actually aware of the vital role of contact tracing in preventing infectious diseases at all times.

Many news reporters, for instance, show no awareness that contact tracing requires confidentially, not just to respect individual privacy but also to earn and maintain the trust needed to collect intimate personal info.

Imagine the level of cooperation with contact tracing if health departments publicly disclosed details that made it easy to identify people and businesses as transmitters of disease.