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中国官方疫情数据失真，不透明性引发外界担忧
官方数字与实际情况脱节，放开后也尚未出现新冠死亡病例通报。分析指出，缺乏可靠的信息可能会产生重大的经济影响，或损害美欧对中国商品出口的需求。
cn.nytimes.com
How Will China Fare With Covid? ‘Meaningless’ Data Clouds the Picture.
Despite assurances that the situation is under control, information on infections has become more opaque now that Beijing has rolled back pandemic restrictions.
Since China dramatically reversed course and loosened its zero-tolerance approach to Covid last week, Beijing has gone all out to convince the public that it can weather the potential risks of lifting restrictions and still put the world’s second-largest economy back on track.
自从中国上周180度急转弯，放松了“新冠清零”政策以来，政府一直在竭尽全力让公众相信，国家能经受住解除防控措施的潜在风险，并能让世界这个第二大经济体的经济重回正轨。
Its once bleak prognostications have turned downright optimistic: Covid-19 is entering the “last stage” and will soon become a manageable seasonal illness, said one of China’s leading voices on the coronavirus. The virus’s spread will peak in a month, predicted another prominent Chinese epidemiologist. A top state TV news anchor declared that “we are on the road” to ending the crisis, with the latest Covid variants less dangerous and officials saying the country’s medical preparedness will protect against the most catastrophic outcomes.
政府对疫情曾经悲观的预言已转变成极为乐观，国内新冠病毒方面的一位主要专家说，疫情正在进入“最后一程”，很快会变成一种可控制的季节性疾病。另一位著名的中国流行病学家则预测，新冠病毒将在一个月内达到感染峰值。中央电视台的一位著名新闻主播宣称，“我们正式迈向了结束疫情生活的道路。”官员们纷纷表示，新冠病毒最新变异株的致病性已经降低，国家有充足的医疗准备，能防止出现最灾难性的后果。
Despite those assurances, China faces much uncertainty over how the coming months will play out. Information is opaque and unreliable, which will make it difficult to gauge Beijing’s handling of the coming wave of Covid infections. The government’s desire to save face after an embarrassing retreat from its hallmark pandemic policy will only muddy the picture.
尽管有这些保证，中国在未来几个月将发生什么仍有很多不确定性。信息的不透明和不可靠让人们难以判断中国政府应对正在出现的一波新冠病毒感染浪潮的做法。政府在尴尬地放弃了标志性的“新冠清零”政策后要挽回面子的想法只会使情况变得更加难辨。
Already, there are signs that China is leveraging propaganda to reinforce its message that the situation is under control. And absent a reliable flow of information, businesses and investors from outside the country are left to speculate on just how long it will take for the economy to recover.
已经有迹象表明，中国正在动用宣传工具来强化一个信息，即国内局面已得到控制。由于缺乏可靠的信息流动，来自国外的企业和投资者只能猜测中国经济复苏将需要多长时间。
Even the most basic question of how many people are infected with Covid in China right now is hard to answer because the government has relaxed mass testing requirements and made reporting at-home test results voluntary.
就连中国目前有多少人感染了新冠病毒这个最基本的问题也很难回答，因为政府放松了大规模核酸检测的要求，允许在家使用抗原检测的人自愿报告结果。
China reported 2,291 newly confirmed cases on Tuesday, a fraction of the roughly 30,000 new infections a day that the country was reporting before it lifted the mass testing requirement. Case numbers are bound to be suppressed even further after China’s National Health Commission said on Wednesday that it would stop reporting asymptomatic infections, which made up the vast majority of positive results in the past.
中国周二通报了2291例新增确诊病例，这个数字是取消大规模核酸检测要求之前每天通报的约3万例新增病例的零头。国家卫生健康委员会周三表示将停止通报无症状感染者，今后的确诊病例数注定会偏低，因为以前的确诊病例中核酸阳性的无症状感染者占大多数。
The downturn in the number of reported infections belies anecdotal evidence of a surging number of positive cases and crowded hospitals with people waiting to be treated. With the change in testing policy, many cities and counties across the country are spreading the mantra of “don’t get tested unless necessary” on official social media. “The statistics are meaningless,” said Jörg Wuttke, president of the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China.
通报的感染病例降低，与阳性人数激增的传闻以及医院里挤满了候诊者的情况不符。随着检测政策的变化，全国许多市县正在其官方社交媒体帐号上传播“非必要不检测”的口号。“官方的统计数据毫无意义，”中国欧盟商会会长伍德克(Jörg Wuttke)说。
Some of China’s data stretches the boundaries of reason for a country with a population of 1.4 billion people. China said there had not been a single Covid-related death since it lifted pandemic restrictions six days ago. By comparison, the United States reported 469 Covid-related deaths on Tuesday alone.
对一个拥有14亿人口的国家来说，中国的一些统计数据超出了合理的界限。中国称，自从六天前放松了“新冠清零”政策以来，还没有出现一例与新冠病毒相关的死亡。相比之下，美国仅在周二一天就有469例与新冠肺炎相关的死亡病例。
Since the early months of the pandemic, virologists have raised questions about China’s official mortality figures, challenging the way that the country’s hospitals classify Covid deaths. Instead of including people who died after contracting Covid-19 in official data, as is the norm in other countries, Chinese hospitals typically attribute deaths to pre-existing or chronic illnesses, such as cancer or a heart condition, they said.
从新冠病毒大流行的最初几个月起，病毒学家就一直怀疑中国官方通报的死亡数据，对中国医院定义新冠病毒死亡的方式提出了质疑。病毒学家说，其他国家的标准是将感染了新冠病毒后死亡的人都包括在死亡病例统计中，但中国的官方数字不包括这些死亡，中国医院通常将这些人的死因归于已有的基础病或慢性病，例如癌症或心脏病。
Underreporting Covid cases is not unique to China, but the country remains especially inscrutable. In reporting “severe” bouts of Covid, the government discloses only the change in the number of cases from the day before, without reporting a total figure. China said it had three more severe cases on Tuesday than on Monday.
漏报新冠病毒死亡病例的国家不只是中国，但中国的数据尤其让人难以捉摸。政府通报的新冠病毒“重症”病例数只给出与前一天相比的变化，不报病例总数。中国周二通报的重症病例比周一多三例。
The lack of reliable data on Covid cases also makes it hard to assess how long it will take the economy to bounce back. The global picture is not looking promising, with both the United States and Europe charting a path toward recession, hurting demand for Chinese exports, a usually dependable pillar of the global economy.
缺乏新冠感染病例的可靠数据也让人很难评估恢复经济将需要多长时间。全球的经济形势看来并不乐观，美国和欧洲的经济都有出现衰退的可能，这会损害对中国商品出口的需求，中国的出口通常是全球经济的一个可靠支柱。
Under China’s no-holds-barred Covid policy, the constant threat of lockdowns and unpredictable quarantines also kept shoppers out of stores, tethered travelers to their homes and discouraged diners from eating out for the better part of three years. But even if customers are now allowed to go out freely, there is still a great deal of trepidation about what lies ahead.
中国不惜一切代价实行“新冠清零”政策时，人们曾面临着什么时候会被封控、会被集中隔离无休止的威胁，让购物者不愿去商店购物，让人们不能出门旅行，也让民众在近三年的时间里不愿外出就餐。尽管现在已允许人们自由出入，但民众仍对未来会发生什么非常惶恐。
Zheng Jingrong, a shop owner who sells handmade imported clothes in Beijing, said she hadn’t bothered to reopen her store yet because there were still no customers.
北京一家销售进口手工服装的店主郑景蓉（音）说，她不打算重新开张，因为仍然没有顾客光临。
“My feeling now is that everyone is afraid of testing positive, and those who are timid dare not go out,” she said. Relaxing the country’s Covid rules is a good first step, but the government needs to do more to support ordinary people and small businesses, Ms. Zheng said, adding that “nothing is certain at the moment.”
“我现在的感觉是，大家都害怕变阳，胆小的人不敢出门，”她说。虽然中国放松严格的“新冠清零”政策是个良好的开端，但政府需要采取更多措施支持普通人和小企业，郑女士说，“目前还不确定。”
Ting Lu, chief China economist for Nomura, a Japanese brokerage, said he wasn’t “too optimistic” about a sharp recovery in the Chinese economy, because he expects continued disruptions from an overwhelmed health care system and a surge in infections. He added that he expected pent-up demand in the economy to be “relatively weak” next year after three years of lockdowns depleted the finances of many Chinese households.
日本券商野村证券首席中国经济学家陆挺表示，他对中国经济会很快复苏不“太乐观”，因为他预计，感染激增和不堪重负的医疗体系将继续给经济造成破坏。他还说，预计被压抑的需求对明年经济的刺激作用会“相对较弱”，因为近三年的封控已耗尽了中国许多家庭的积蓄。
Part of the uncertainty hanging over how China will emerge from “zero Covid” is that no country of this size has pivoted this quickly, this drastically — shifting seemingly overnight from full-on assault against Covid to learning to live with the virus. Long-established rules are changing by the day.
在一定程度上，笼罩在中国如何走出“新冠清零”头上的不确定性在于，没有一个如此大的国家如此迅速、彻底地改变做法，中国从竭尽全力遏制新冠病毒到学会与病毒共存的转变，似乎发生在一夜之间。执行了很久的规定每天都在变。
As of last week, asymptomatic or light cases no longer required hospital stays. All restrictions on purchasing flu and pain relief medication were also lifted, igniting a run on fever pills and even some traditional Chinese medicines. On Tuesday, China also disabled a travel tracking app, one of many smartphone apps that the government used to keep tabs on the whereabouts of Chinese citizens to assess their Covid risk.
从上周开始，无症状或轻症感染者不再需要住院治疗。政府取消了禁止药店出售感冒药和止痛药的所有限制，导致药店的退烧药甚至一些中成药被抢购一空。中国周二还停止了行程码的使用，那是一款政府为了评估人们接触新冠病毒的风险，用来跟踪人们旅行的手机应用之一。
Two months ago, before throngs of people took to the streets to protest the government’s draconian Covid policies, Xi Jinping, China’s leader, said Covid posed such a grave public health risk that fighting the virus required an “all-out war.”
两个月前，很多人走上街头抗议政府严厉的“新冠清零”政策的活动还没有发生，那时，中国领导人习近平曾表示，因为新冠病毒对公共卫生构成的严重风险，有必要对病毒展开一场“全面战争”。
“It’s amazing how in two weeks the entire control system has evaporated,” Mr. Wuttke said. “What does this do to business? I don’t know.”
“整个防控系统在不到两周的时间里消失，令人大为惊奇，”伍德克说。“这对企业有什么影响？我不知道。”
Mark Woolhouse, a professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, said when Australia and New Zealand abandoned their zero-Covid ambitions last year, they were able to do so somewhat successfully because they had implemented “effective vaccination programs with effective vaccines.”
爱丁堡大学传染病流行病学教授马克·伍尔豪斯表示，澳大利亚和新西兰去年放弃他们追求的清零目标时，他们之所能在一定程度上取得成功，是因为他们已“使用有效疫苗开展了有效的疫苗接种计划”。
However, in the case of China, both of those factors are in doubt. In China, roughly two-thirds of people over 60 and only 40 percent of people over 80 have received a booster shot. The World Health Organization has said the boosters are critical when it comes to China’s homegrown vaccines, which use inactivated virus and are shown to be less effective than foreign alternatives that use newer mRNA technology.
但对中国情况而言，疫苗的有效性和接种计划的有效性都值得怀疑。中国60岁以上的人口当中大约三分之二打了疫苗加强针，而80岁以上的老年人中只有40%打了加强针。世界卫生组织认为，打加强针对中国国产疫苗至关重要，因为国产疫苗使用的是灭活病毒，已被证明不如使用新的mRNA技术的外国疫苗有效。
On Wednesday, China’s health regulator said it was rolling out a second vaccine booster for high-risk groups and people over 60.
中国政府周三表示，将在感染高风险人群、60岁以上老年人群中开展第二剂次加强免疫接种。
Without extensive coverage and a highly effective vaccine, there is the “potential for a very big public health problem,” Mr. Woolhouse said.
疫苗覆盖范围不广、缺少高效力疫苗，“有引发重大的公共卫生问题的可能”，伍尔豪斯说。
For Zhu Yan, who owns a hostel by Qionghai Lake, a tourist destination in Sichuan Province, the Covid restrictions had damaged her business. She said there were still no visitors because people are afraid of contracting the virus. While it may take some time for the economy and her business to recover, she said she was at least feeling hopeful again.
朱艳（音）在四川省旅游胜地邛海湖畔拥有一家小旅馆，新冠病毒防控措施曾让她的生意受损。她说现在仍没有游客，因为人们害怕感染病毒。尽管经济和生意的恢复可能还需要一段时间，但她说，她至少再次感到了希望。
Ms. Zhu, 40, said she was hoping that China could reach herd immunity so that life could return to normal. In fact, she hopes to test positive soon because she figures it is better to get Covid early on.
现年40岁的朱女士说，她希望中国能够实现群体免疫，让生活恢复正常。事实上，她希望自己能快点阳，因为她觉得最好早点感染新冠病毒。
“It is impossible to lock everyone up at home and lock them up forever, right?” Ms. Zhu said. “What should come will come, you can’t escape. You have to take this path, and everyone has to take this step, so that China can get on with normal work and life.”
“不可能把所有人都关在家里，永远关起来吧？”朱女士说。“该来的总会来的，逃不掉的。大家必须走这条路，每个人都必须迈出这一步，中国的工作和生活才能正常。”
