I don't think there is any malice, it's just ignorance. We're in uncharted territory here and people have no idea how to behave. Not to mention humans are social creatures and it's very much against our instincts to be shut-ins that don't interact.
| ...those people recorded while spreading their spit all over a train cart.
are simply acting in ignorance because they have no idea how to behave?
Small point of disagreement on this one. There may not be a 1:1 correspondence between what’s happening now and any exact historical event, but I would have hoped that traditionally Western nations would have studied countries affected by SARS (et al.) and learned from their successes/failures.