Contact tracing will, and should, remain a vital part of the response to COVID-19 for many months to come.

Since public health responses to a global pandemic generally fall within national jurisdictions, it makes sense that a country’s health authorities will give heightened attention to the first cases of a disease recognised within its borders. Yet authorities should remember that some will interpret this attention as an encouragement to blame outsiders for the disease, feeding into long histories of viewing other parts of the world as disease incubators.

In locations where the virus has not yet become apparent, vigorous tracing of new cases and testing their contacts in a bid for “containment” can help prevent a shift to undetected “community spread”. And in areas where the virus is widespread and the population has been subjected to restrictive measures, any relaxing of controls will also require the careful investigation of new cases to avoid a re-escalation of infections.

Regardless, there should be no more “patient zero” in our stories of COVID-19. We must be conscious of the stories we tell and the connections we trace, remaining mindful of the ripple effects these can have. Writing of a “patient zero” is a damaging red herring that distracts from constructive efforts to contain the epidemic. Let’s wash our hands of this toxic phrase. Our general health, and our ability to understand epidemics now and in the future, will be stronger as a result.

Richard McKay, Wellcome Trust Research Fellow, Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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