纽约时报中文网 - 英文原版-英WHO Says China Has Shared Data Indicating No Novel Pathogen
November 24, 2023 3 min 459 words
这篇报道揭示了世卫组织表示中国已分享数据，排除了新型病原体的可能性。然而，这是否足以平息对疫情起源的质疑仍是一个关键问题。信息的透明度和真实性是当前全球关切的焦点。面对国际社会对病毒溯源的怀疑，中国政府应更主动合作，提供更全面的数据，并允许独立第三方调查。这不仅是对全球公共卫生责任的体现，更是维护国际信任和合作的关键一步。在信息互联的时代，透明度和协作是解决全球卫生危机的关键，希望各国共同努力，推动疫情起源问题的真相浮出水面。
The World Health Organization said that China had shared data about a recent surge in respiratory illnesses in children, one day after the agency said it was seeking information about the possibility of undiagnosed pneumonia cases there.
The Chinese data indicated “no detection of any unusual or novel pathogens,” according to a W.H.O. statement on Thursday. The data, which included laboratory results from infected children, indicated that the rise in cases was a result of known viruses and bacteria, such as influenza and mycoplasma pneumoniae, a bacterium that causes usually mild illness.
Hospital admissions of children had increased since May, as had outpatient visits, but hospitals were able to handle the increase, China told the global health agency.
The W.H.O. had made the request for information after Chinese news reports, as well as social media posts, had indicated a notable surge in sick children in recent weeks. Parents reported long lines, sometimes of eight hours or more, at children’s hospitals. China’s National Health Commission acknowledged the reports of overcrowding.
Some of those reports also caught the attention this week of members of ProMED, a disease tracking site run by the International Society for Infectious Diseases that health officials monitor for early warnings of potential emerging diseases.
China’s transparency in reporting outbreaks has been the subject of intense global scrutiny, after it covered up early cases of both the SARS virus in 2003 and the virus that led to the coronavirus pandemic in 2020. The W.H.O. early this year rebuked Chinese officials for withholding data that the agency said could shed light on the coronavirus’s origins.
The W.H.O. issued its formal request for data one day after a ProMED member shared a news report from Taiwan about an uptick in sick children in Beijing and Liaoning, a northeastern Chinese province. Chinese officials had already publicly acknowledged an increase in respiratory diseases among children, but the W.H.O. said that it was unclear at the time whether that increase was caused by known pathogens.
“A key purpose was to identify whether there have been ‘clusters of undiagnosed pneumonia’ in Beijing and Liaoning as referred to in media reports,” the W.H.O. statement said.
The W.H.O. said the increased infections in China were earlier in the season than historically expected, but “not unexpected,” given that this was the first winter since China had lifted the stringent coronavirus restrictions it imposed in 2020. Other countries had experienced similar leaps in other illnesses after lifting their Covid controls.