[2023-03-18] 纽约时报 - 世卫组织指责中国隐瞒疫情起源的数据

 

Genetic research from China suggests to some experts that the coronavirus may have sprung from a market in Wuhan. Now the data are missing from a scientific database.
来自中国的基因研究向一些专家表明，冠状病毒可能起源于武汉的一个市场。 现在科学数据库中缺少数据。

 

The World Health Organization rebuked Chinese officials on Friday for withholding research that may link Covid’s origin to wild animals, asking why the data had not been made available three years ago and why it is now missing.
世界卫生组织周五斥责中国官员不进行可能将武汉肺炎病毒起源与野生动物联系起来的研究，并质问为什么三年前没有提供这些数据，现在也不见了。

Before the Chinese data disappeared, an international team of virus experts downloaded and began analyzing the research, which appeared online in January. They say it supports the idea that the pandemic could have begun when illegally traded raccoon dogs infected humans at a Wuhan seafood market.
在中国数据消失之前，一个国际病毒专家小组下载并开始分析该研究，该研究于 1 月份出现在网上。 他们说，这支持了这样一种观点，即当武汉海鲜市场非法交易的貉感染人类时，疫情可能已经开始。

But the gene sequences were removed from a scientific database once the experts offered to collaborate on the analysis with their Chinese counterparts.
但是，一旦专家提出与中国同行合作进行分析，基因序列就从科学数据库中删除了。

“These data could have — and should have — been shared three years ago,” Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the W.H.O.’s director general, said. The missing evidence now “needs to be shared with the international community immediately,” he said.
“这些数据本可以——而且应该——在三年前共享，”世卫组织总干事谭德塞博士说。 他说，现在丢失的证据“需要立即与国际社会分享”。

According to the experts who are reviewing it, the research offers evidence that raccoon dogs, fox-like animals known to spread coronaviruses, had left behind DNA in the same place in the Wuhan market that genetic signatures of the new coronavirus also were discovered.
据审查该研究的专家称，该研究提供的证据表明，浣熊是一种已知会传播冠状病毒的类狐动物，它们在武汉市场的同一地点留下了 DNA，新型冠状病毒的基因特征也被发现。

To some experts, that finding suggests that the animals may have been infected and may have transmitted the virus to humans.
对一些专家来说，这一发现表明这些动物可能已经被感染并且可能已经将病毒传播给人类。

With huge amounts of genetic information drawn from swabs of animal cages, carts and other surfaces at the Wuhan market in early 2020, the genetic data had been the focus of restless anticipation among virus experts since they learned of it a year ago in a paper by Chinese scientists.
2020 年初，从武汉市场的动物笼子、推车和其他表面的拭子中提取了大量遗传信息，自从一年前在一篇由 中国科学家。

A French biologist discovered the genetic sequences in the database last week, and she and a team of colleagues began mining them for clues about the origins of the pandemic.
一位法国生物学家上周在数据库中发现了基因序列，她和同事团队开始挖掘这些基因序列，以寻找有关疫情起源的线索。

That team has not yet released a paper outlining the findings. But the researchers delivered an analysis of the material to a W.H.O. advisory group studying Covid’s origins this week in a meeting that also included a presentation by Chinese researchers regarding the same data.
该团队尚未发表概述调查结果的论文。 但研究人员向 W.H.O. 提交了一份材料分析报告。 咨询小组本周在一次会议上研究了武汉肺炎病毒的起源，会议上还包括中国研究人员关于相同数据的演讲。

 

The analysis seemed to clash with earlier contentions by Chinese scientists that samples taken in the market that were positive for the coronavirus had been ferried in by sick people alone, said Sarah Cobey, an epidemiologist and evolutionary biologist at the University of Chicago who was not involved in the recent research.
并未参与最近科研活动的芝加哥大学的流行病学家和进化生物学家Sarah Cobey 说，这一分析似乎与中国科学家早些时候的论点相冲突，即在市场上采集的冠状病毒呈阳性的样本是由病人单独携带的。

“It’s just very unlikely to be seeing this much animal DNA, especially raccoon dog DNA, mixed in with viral samples, if it’s simply mostly human contamination,” Dr. Cobey said.
科比博士说：“如果病毒样本主要是人类污染，就不太可能看到这么多动物 DNA，尤其是浣熊 DNA，与病毒样本混合在一起。”

Questions remain about how the samples were collected, what precisely they contained and why the evidence had disappeared. In light of the ambiguities, many scientists reacted cautiously, saying that it was difficult to assess the research without seeing a complete report.
关于样本是如何收集的、样本究竟包含什么以及证据为何消失等问题仍然存在。 鉴于含糊不清，许多科学家反应谨慎，表示在没有看到完整报告的情况下很难评估这项研究。

The idea that a lab accident could have accidentally set off the pandemic has become the focus of renewed interest in recent weeks, thanks in part to a fresh intelligence assessment from the Department of Energy and hearings held by the new Republican House leadership.
最近几周，实验室事故可能意外引发疫情的想法成为人们重新关注的焦点，这在一定程度上要归功于能源部的新情报评估和新的共和党众议院领导层举行的听证会。

But a number of virus experts not involved with the latest analysis said that what was known about the swabs gathered in the market buttressed the case that animals sold there had sparked the pandemic.
但一些没有参与最新分析的病毒专家表示，对市场上采集的拭子的研究巩固了那里出售的动物引发了疫情的说法。

“It’s exactly what you’d expect if the virus was emerging from an intermediate or multiple intermediate hosts in the market,” Dr. Cobey said. “I think ecologically, this is close to a closed case.”
“如果病毒是从市场上的一个或多个中间宿主中出现的，这正是你所期望的，”Cobey 博士说。 “我认为从生态角度来看，这接近于结案。”

Dr. Cobey was one of 18 scientists who signed an influential letter in the journal Science in May 2021 urging serious consideration of a scenario in which the virus could have spilled out of a laboratory in Wuhan.
科比博士是 2021 年 5 月在《科学》杂志上签署了一封有影响力的信函的 18 位科学家之一，信中敦促认真考虑病毒可能从武汉的实验室泄漏的情况。

On Friday, she said lab leaks continued to pose enormous risks and that more oversight of research into dangerous pathogens was needed. But Dr. Cobey added that an accumulation of evidence — relating to the clustering of human cases around the Wuhan market, the genetic diversity of viruses there, and now the raccoon dog data — strengthened the case for a market origin.
周五，她表示实验室泄漏继续构成巨大风险，需要对危险病原体的研究进行更多监督。 但 Cobey 博士补充说，越来越多的证据——与武汉市场周围人类病例的聚集、那里病毒的遗传多样性以及现在的貉数据有关——加强了市场起源的论据。

The new genetic data do not appear to prove that a raccoon dog was infected with the coronavirus. Even if it had been, the possibility would remain that another animal could have passed that virus to people, or even that someone infected with the virus could have transmitted it to a raccoon dog.
新的基因数据似乎并不能证明貉感染了冠状病毒。 即使是这样，仍有可能是另一只动物将该病毒传染给了人类，甚至感染了该病毒的人也可能将其传染给了浣熊。

Some scientists stressed those points on Friday, saying that the new genetic data did not appreciably shift the discussion about the pandemic’s origins.
周五，一些科学家强调了这些观点，称新的基因数据并未明显改变关于疫情起源的讨论。

“We know it’s a promiscuous virus that infects a bunch of species,” said David Fisman, an epidemiologist at the University of Toronto, who also signed the May 2021 letter in Science.
多伦多大学的流行病学家大卫·菲斯曼 (David Fisman) 说：“我们知道这是一种混杂的病毒，会感染一群物种。”他还签署了《科学》杂志 2021 年 5 月的一封信。

Chinese scientists had released a study in February 2022 looking at the market samples. Some scientists speculated that the Chinese researchers might have posted the data in January because they were required to make them available as part of a review of their study by a scientific journal.
中国科学家于 2022 年 2 月发布了一项针对市场样本的研究。 一些科学家推测，中国研究人员可能在 1 月份发布了这些数据，因为科学期刊要求他们提供这些数据，作为对他们研究的评论的一部分。

The Chinese study had suggested that samples that were positive for the virus had come from infected people, rather than from animals sold in the market. That fit with a narrative long promulgated by Chinese officials: that the virus sprang not only from outside the market, but also from outside the country altogether.
中国的研究表明，病毒呈阳性的样本来自感染者，而不是市场上出售的动物。 这与中国官员长期宣扬的说法相吻合：该病毒不仅来自市场之外，而且完全来自国外。

But the Chinese report had left clues that viral material at the market had been jumbled together with genetic material from animals. And scientists said that the new analysis by the international team illustrated an even stronger link with animals.
但中国的报告留下了市场上的病毒材料与动物遗传材料混杂在一起的线索。 科学家们表示，国际团队的新分析表明与动物的联系更加紧密。

“Scientifically, it doesn’t prove that raccoon dogs were the source, but it sure smells like infected raccoon dogs were at the market,” said Jeremy Kamil, a virologist at Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center Shreveport.
路易斯安那州立大学健康科学中心什里夫波特的病毒学家杰里米卡米尔说：“从科学上讲，这并不能证明浣熊是源头，但它确实闻起来像市场上受感染的浣熊。”

He added, “It raises more questions about what the Chinese government really knows.”
他补充说，“这引发了更多关于中国政府真正了解的问题。”

Scientists cautioned that it was not clear that the genetic material from the virus and from raccoon dogs had been deposited at the same time.
科学家警告说，目前尚不清楚病毒和浣熊的遗传物质是否同时沉积。

Depending on the stability of genetic material from the virus and the animals, said Michael Imperiale, a virologist at the University of Michigan, “they could have been deposited there at potentially widely different times.”
密歇根大学病毒学家 Michael Imperiale 说，根据病毒和动物遗传物质的稳定性，“它们可能在可能截然不同的时间存放在那里。”

Still, Dr. Arturo Casadevall, an immunologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health who co-authored a recent study with Dr. Imperiale examining the origin of the coronavirus, said that linking animal and viral material nevertheless added to the evidence of a natural spillover event.
尽管如此，最近与 Imperiale博士合作研究冠状病毒起源的约翰霍普金斯大学彭博公共卫生学院的免疫学家 Arturo Casadevall 博士说，将动物和病毒材料联系起来加强了武汉肺炎病毒源于自然突发事件的可能。

“I would say it strengthens the zoonotic idea,” he said, “that is, the idea that it came from an animal at the market.”
“我会说它加强了人畜共患病的想法，”他说，“也就是说，它来自市场上的动物。”

In the absence of the actual animal that first spread the virus to people, Dr. Casadevall said, assessing the origins of an outbreak would always involve weighing probabilities. In this case, animals sold at the market were removed before researchers began taking samples in early 2020, making it impossible to find a culprit.
Casadevall 博士说，在没有首先将病毒传播给人类的实际动物的情况下，评估爆发的起源总是需要权衡概率。 在这种情况下，市场上出售的动物在研究人员于 2020 年初开始取样之前就被移除，因此无法找到罪魁祸首。

Tim Stearns, the dean of graduate and postgraduate studies at the Rockefeller University in New York, said that the latest finding was “an interesting piece of the puzzle,” though he said it was “not in itself definitive and highlights the need for a more thorough investigation.”
纽约洛克菲勒大学 (Rockefeller University) 研究生院院长蒂姆·斯特恩斯 (Tim Stearns) 表示，最新发现是“一块有趣的拼图”，尽管他表示“它本身并不是决定性的，并强调需要进行更深入的研究” 彻底调查。”

For all the missing elements, some scientists said that the new findings highlighted just how much information scientists had managed to assemble about the beginnings of the pandemic, including home addresses for early patients and sequence data from the market.
对于所有缺失的元素，一些科学家表示，新发现突显了科学家们设法收集了多少关于疫情开始的信息，包括早期患者的家庭住址和来自市场的序列数据。

Theodora Hatziioannou, a virologist at the Rockefeller University, said that it was critical that the raw data be released. But, she said, “I think the evidence is overwhelming at the moment toward a market origin.”
洛克菲勒大学病毒学家 Theodora Hatziioannou 表示，发布原始数据至关重要。 但是，她说，“我认为目前有压倒性的证据表明市场起源。”

And the latest data, she said, “makes it even more unlikely that this started somewhere else.”
她说，最新数据“更不可能从其他地方开始。”

Felicia Goodrum, an immunobiologist at the University of Arizona, said that finding the virus in an actual animal would be the strongest evidence of a market origin. But finding virus and animal material in the same swab was close.
亚利桑那大学的免疫生物学家 Felicia Goodrum 说，在活体动物身上发现这种病毒将是市场起源的最有力证据。 但是在同一个拭子中发现病毒和动物样本已经很接近了。

“To me,” she said, “this is the next best thing.”
“对我来说，”她说，“这已经不错了。”

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