What Does Quarantine Even Mean Now?
How we isolate is about our values, not just our health
Over the course of 2020, the meaning of the word quarantine has changed dramatically, and not only because it’s gone from an infrequently deployed epidemiologic tool into a mainstream experience.
Historically, quarantine has been a passive state, based on the assumption that you were already infected and others needed to be protected from whatever pathogens you were harboring. You were put in quarantine by government or health officials, and you spent it waiting around, hoping that nothing would happen.
As we enter month seven of the pandemic, the word’s definition has changed because the way we quarantine has changed. We’re engaging in a new and active form of quarantine. You won’t hear scientists or lexicographers using the term this way, but in casual conversations, quarantine is no longer so passive. We’ve decided that we can be the masters of our own quarantine, and in doing so, we’ve transformed the term into a description for the way we engage with the world.
If it wasn’t an essential public health strategy, quarantine would be at risk of being a trend so hot it’s burning itself out. We’ve mulled quarantine for couples, quarantine for singles, quarantine for extroverts, quarantine strategies according to…
