伦敦：自新冠肺炎疫情以来，我们对新发疫情爆发都有点神经过敏。因此，西伯利亚一家鼠疫研究所的实验室技术员死亡事件让所有人都进入了高度戒备状态，这也可以理解。
LONDON: After the COVID-19 pandemic, we’re all a little jumpy when it comes to new disease outbreaks. So it’s understandable that the death of a lab technician working at a plague research institute in Siberia has put everyone on high alert.
但尽管目前我们对该案仍知之甚少，俄罗斯还有一个值得更多关注和警惕的健康威胁正在酝酿。关于疑似鼠疫感染的细节仍然模糊不清。
But while there’s still much we don’t know about that case, there is another health threat brewing in Russia that deserves more attention and alarm. The details of the suspected plague infection are murky.
当地媒体报道称，28岁的达里亚·希皮洛娃可能在工作场所发生事故后感染了肺鼠疫，尽管这些报道尚未得到证实。俄罗斯当局表示，大约200名她的密切接触者已被隔离。
Local media coverage suggested that 28-year-old Darya Shipilova may have contracted pneumonic plague after an accident at her workplace, though those reports have not been verified. Russian authorities have said that about 200 of her contacts were quarantined.
肺鼠疫是一种严重感染，当鼠疫耶尔森菌感染肺部时就会发生。若不及时治疗，几乎总是致命的。
Pneumonic plague is a severe infection that occurs when the bacterium Yersinia pestis infects the lungs. Without treatment, it’s nearly always fatal.
官方称，希皮洛娃的死因被归因于“来源不明”的肺炎，俄罗斯当局已向世界卫生组织通报，该地区未发生鼠疫病例。世界卫生组织已要求提供更多细节，美国总统唐纳德·特朗普表示他已安排与俄罗斯总统弗拉基米尔·普京通话，以讨论此事。
Officially, Shipilova’s death has been attributed to pneumonia of “unknown” origin, and Russian authorities have told the World Health Organization that no plague case had beened in the region. The WHO has requested further details, and US President Donald Trump has said he has a call scheduled with Russia’s Vladimir Putin to discuss the incident.
世界卫生组织表示，目前信息不足以进行全面风险评估，且俄罗斯对其询问的响应过于缓慢，称这种延迟“不可接受”。该国响应的不透明令人担忧——不仅仅是因为潜在的鼠疫并非西伯利亚唯一的公共卫生问题。
The WHO says it doesn’t have enough information to conduct a full risk assessment and that Russia has been too slow to respond to its inquiries, calling the delay “not okay”. The opacity of the country’s response is worrying - not least because the potential plague is not Siberia’s only public health concern.
另一个担忧：我最担心的问题在于该地区的永久冻土层，在那里，以前大流行病的遗迹被低温保存。科学家们在一具300年前的木乃伊体内检测到了天花病毒DNA，并在一具自1918年以来埋藏在土中的尸体肺部发现了流感病毒RNA。
THE OTHER WORRY The one I’m most worried about lies in the region’s permafrost, where remnants of previous pandemics are preserved in the cold. There, smallpox virus DNA was detected in a 300-year-old mummy and influenza virus RNA was found in the lung of a body lodged in the earth since 1918.
科学家如今已经能够复苏那些在永久冻土中沉睡了数万年的病原体。
Scientists have now been able to revive pathogens that have lain dormant in the permafrost for tens of thousands of years.
一些病毒既迷人又不具威胁性，例如只能攻击单细胞变形虫的巨型病毒。另一些则是常见人类病原体的近亲，如葡萄球菌（金黄色葡萄球菌）和弯曲杆菌（腹泻病最常见的病因）。
Some are fascinating but not threatening, such as the giant viruses that can only target single-celled amoebas. Others are relatives of common human pathogens such as Staphylococci (staph bacteria) and Campylobacter (the most common cause of diarrhoeal diseases).
虽然我们拥有应对这些熟悉病原体的药物，但冻土中细菌携带抗生素耐药基因的比例却出乎意料地高。更令人担忧的是，可能曾导致尼安德特尔人或猛犸象灭绝的病毒和细菌，如今对我们来说可能是全新的威胁。
Although we have drugs that should be able to defend against these familiar foes, there is a surprisingly high prevalence of antibiotic-resistant genes among bacteria in the frozen ground. Even scarier are the viruses and bacteria that may have played a role in the demise of Neanderthals or mammoths, and would be new to us today.
当然，如果气候保持稳定，这一切都不会成为问题。但人为导致的气候变化正使北极地区的升温速度达到全球平均水平的四倍。
Of course, none of this would be a problem if our climate was stable. But human-caused climate change is warming the Arctic up to four times faster than the rest of the planet.
永久冻土正在快速融化，这增加了古老病原体“潘多拉魔盒”被释放的风险。随着该地区工业化程度的提升以及随之而来的外来务工人员增多，疫情向世界其他地区扩散的风险也在加剧。僵尸病原体？
The permafrost is rapidly thawing, raising the risk that a Pandora’s Box of ancient pathogens will be unleashed. The danger is heightened by the growing industrialisation of the region and resulting increase in migrant workers, who raise the risk of spreading any outbreak to less remote parts of the world. A ZOMBIE PATHOGEN?
尽管“僵尸病原体”听起来像是科幻情节，但值得考虑的是：炎热干燥的夏季导致西伯利亚永久冻土融化，随后在2016年引发了一次炭疽爆发，造成一名12岁男孩死亡以及超过2300只驯鹿死亡。
As far-fetched as the appearance of a zombie pathogen might sound, consider that thawing Siberian permafrost after a hot, dry summer led to a 2016 anthrax outbreak that killed a 12-year-old boy and more than 2,300 reindeer.
2023年，来自法国、德国和俄罗斯的科学家发表了一篇论文，警告称永久冻土融化带来的健康风险非常真实，值得进一步研究。然而，由于世界上大部分永久冻土位于俄罗斯，普京发动的乌克兰战争已经使科研合作和信息共享变得复杂。
In 2023, scientists from France, Germany and Russia published a paper warning that the health risks of melting permafrost are very real and warrant further study. But with most of the world’s permafrost located in Russia, Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has complicated research partnerships and information sharing.
而且，正如围绕疑似鼠疫死亡事件缺乏细节所显示的那样，俄罗斯是否会主动透露来自永久冻土的任何潜在风险，目前仍不得而知。
And as the lack of detail surrounding the suspected plague death demonstrates, it’s not at all clear that Russia would be forthcoming about any risk emerging from the permafrost.
正如世界卫生组织总干事特德罗斯·阿达诺姆·格布雷耶苏斯在周四（10月8日）的一篇X帖子中所写的那样，关于对希皮洛娃死亡的调查：“根据《国际卫生条例》进行及时、完整和透明的信息共享对于澄清相互矛盾的报道和准确评估潜在公共卫生风险至关重要。”这句话同样适用于僵尸病原体，也适用于瘟疫。
As Tedros Ghebreyesus, director-general of the WHO, wrote in an X post on Thursday (Oct 8) about the investigation of Shipilova’s death: “Timely, complete and transparent information sharing under the International Health Regulations is essential to clarify conflicting reports and enable an accurate assessment of potential public health risks”. That’s as true for zombie pathogens as it for plagues.