State's new contact tracers have a problem: A lot of people don't answer their phone calls, thinking they're junk calls

Guilty.

(Edit: Of ignoring calls from unfamiliar numbers. Hopefully I haven't ignored a contact tracing call.)

That's what happens when you use an 857 number.

Do millenials even know how to leave a voice mail or retrieve one from their inbox?

Serious question.

I'm one of those people who would never answer a phone call from an unknown number, though I would listen to a voicemail message, and return the call if it sounded legit. But I think it would be more effective if they sent text messages, assuming that would be legal.

If the spam phoners hadn't conditioned us not to answer calls from people we don't know, this wouldn't be a problem. But when most calls are robocalls or scammers, why answer?

Phones used to be useful things. If your phone rang, chances were good that it was a call you wanted to take. Our pathetically inadequate response to the problem of junk calls means that now we don’t answer the phone. So much utility is lost: there are many legitimate and beneficial reasons to call someone who doesn’t have your number in their contact list, the present example being just one of many. We allowed parasites to seriously diminish the value of telephony as a technology; we didn’t have to.

do not answer the call. It's conceivable I might if it was the same number a few times.

But aren't the mayor and the governor on TV every day? Couldn't the calls not just all just show up under a single number widely publicized by one of both of them?

First, there has been a surge of incoming calls to people because the junk callers and debt collectors know people are home so that alone has caused an increase in unidentified calls.

Second, in my case if you are not programmed into my phone and i do not know who you are from my own programming, or if your number sends a VALID caller ID, you go to voice mail. Most of the junk callers and even some legit people hang up once they hear the voice mail kick in.

The third and more serious issue is the called ID system itself. After some research i found out that all of the major carriers have their own caller ID database and none of them connect to each other. In the last couple of years I have received calls from candidates campaigns for public office that I might have spoken to but the caller ID said that it was likely Spam. I've run into this with internal numbers at some businesses I speak to that did not have the foresight to make sure all of their lines displayed their main number.

The same thing is happening with city hall staffers that are working from home. While the calls are being routed to the staffer on call from city hall, if they call you back it is their personal number, and if that number ever had a bad reputation it displays as a spam call. I've already had to advise a few of this (I deal with the city a lot).

The lack of coordination on the caller ID databases also has some humorous results. For some time when i called a friend she would not answer, I;d l;eave a message and she would eventually call back. Eventually she started to answer the phone by saying "Hi Rachel." When i asked why, she said that was the name coming up on her caller ID. Despite her complaints to Verizon (her carriier) and my own complaints to my carrier (T-Mobile) there has never been any resolution. My friend is a senior who has no clue how to program her phone so she just needs to equate "Rachel" with me.

So I guess I need to get in touch with my feminine self if that helps any.

Side Bar... While government has managed to get public utilities to stay disconnects, they did not do that with the telecommunications people, which are no longer regulated as public utilities. So even if you are out of work and flat broke, your cell phone bill is still due and subject to automated disconnect by a mindless computer. Allegedly, they will still be able to call 911 if that happens but won't be able to talk to a doctor or check on a sick relative. Way to go.

The state says the contact tracing calls are to inform people to "isolate" until they are not contagious but aren't we already isolating? Plus, many who receive the calls will be among those that already had it, including the 80+% of those infected who may have had it without even knowing or had symptoms so mild that they didn't seek testing. They would have the antibodies and not need any more restrictions than those already in place.

I'm sure the massive, state-run contact tracing is well-intentioned but seems meaningless when the calls are often ignored and strong precautions are already in place for all. It might be a lot wiser and cheaper to advise everyone to act as though they have it and are contagious, then shelter the elderly and pre-exisiting conditioned who make up almost all of the deadly cases. Governor Baker has said that with current restrictions, most of those infected only have, on average, three friends/relatives to warn via contact tracing. Couldn't the infected person send out three texts rather than create a new, less than effective state bureaucracy?