Is someone who gets just a few hives from aspirin in as much danger as someone with aerd, for example?

Likely not: Aerd raises the ante so to speak. Those patients have the added concern of respiratory distress that other patients may not experience despite a NSAID allergy. Any respiratory symptoms can complicate an allergic reaction, or increase the danger as you put it.

No: Those with aerd react adversely to all nsaids except for the cox-2 types. Those with hives are specifically allergic to that NSAID and not others. If there was just a single incidence of hives from asa , this might have been coincidental. However it this has been proven , then you must avoid asa since the next reaction could be more severe.These are actually 2 different diseases.