《经济学人》指责英国政府“不作为”（上）

作者：Alice的学习笔记

在2020年6月20日英国版《经济学人》上发表了一篇"反省文"，作者分析了英国抗疫现状，也指责了英国政府以及首相在疫情治理上的“不作为”。而在这一期的封面上，非常有创意地结合了冠状病毒与英国国旗。反省态度值得肯定~

注意：文中的英文文本来自《经济学人》，中文翻译和注释仅供参考。

原文（无注释）：

有注释版：

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There was a lot going on in Britain in early March. London staged an England-Wales rugby match on March 7th, which the prime minister attended along with a crowd of 81,000; on March 11th Liverpool played Atletico Madrid, in front of a crowd of 52,000 fans, including 3,000 from Spain; 252,000 punters went to the Cheltenham Festival, one of the country’s poshest steeplechase meetings, which ended on March 13th.

在今年3月初，英国举行了很多活动。3月7日，首相和8万1千人参加了在伦敦举办的英格兰对威尔士的橄榄球比赛；3月11日，在现场的5万2千名粉丝面前，利物浦队对战马德里竞技，而其中有3千名粉丝来西班牙；在3月13日结束的切尔滕纳姆节，有25万2千赌马人参加了这场全国最盛大的越野障碍赛马。

• pandemic
  全国或全球性的流行病，英文解释为：A pandemic is an occurance of a disease that affects many people over a very wide area.

• leader
  1）表示报纸上的社论，社评
  英文解释为：A leader in a newspaper is a piece of writing which gives the editor's opinion on an important news item.美式英语中多用editorial。
  2）表示报纸的要闻，头条
  A leader in a newspaper is the most important story in it.也可以用“lead”或者“lead story”表示。

• stage
  组织（活动或仪式）
     Atlantic city is the hot favourite to stage the fight.
     在大西洋举行的这场拳击赛是众望所归。

• posh
  时髦的，豪华的，英文解释为：If you describe something as posh, you mean that it is smart, fashionable, and expensive.
     ……a posh dinner party
     一场盛大的宴会
     ……a posh car
     豪车

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As Britons were getting together to amuse themselves and infect each other, Europe was shutting down. Borders were closing, public gatherings being banned. Italy went into full lockdown on March 9th, Denmark on March 11th, Spain on March 14th and France on March 17th. Britain followed only on March 23rd.

在英国人一边聚众自娱自乐，一边互相传染时，欧洲正在闭关。边境关闭了，公众聚集活动也被禁止。意大利在3月9日就开始了完全的活动限制，丹麦在3月11日，西班牙在3月14日，法国在3月17日（纷纷进入了全面封锁状态）。但是英国却在3月23日才开始。

• infect
  传染，感染
     A single mosquito can infect a large number of people.
     一只蚊子就可以感染很多人。
     ……objects used by an infected person.
     被感染者使用过的物品。

• lockdown
  活动（或行动）限制，英文解释为：A lockdown is a requirement for people to stay where they are, usually due to specific risks to themselves or to others if they can move freely.

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Putting in place sweeping restrictions on everyday life was a difficult decision, fraught with uncertainty. Yet the delay is just one example of the government’s tardiness. Britain has been slow to increase testing, identify a contact-tracing app, stop visits to care homes, ban big public events, provide its health workers with personal protective equipment (PPE), and require people to wear face coverings on public transport. As this wave of the disease ebbs, Britons are wondering how they came to have the highest overall death rate of any country in the rich world, and why leaving lockdown is proving so difficult.

在日常生活中落实全面限制是一个艰难的决定，并且充满了不确定性。然而，英国政府的延误只是其行事拖拉的表现之一。英国在很多方面行动过慢，如：增加检测，找出一款接触追踪APP软件，停止护理中心的访问，禁止大型公共活动，提供给医疗工作者个人防护设备，并且要求群众在公共交通中佩戴面部遮盖物等等。随着这场疫情的减退，英国人不仅想问，为什么英国的总体死亡率是所有发达国家中最高的？为什么想停止当前的行动限制仍然比较困难？

• sweeping
  1）全面的，重要的，影响深远的
     ……sweeping economic reforms
     全面的经济改革
  2）（贬义）笼统的，一概而论的
  英文解释为：If someone makes a sweeping statement or generalization, they make a statement which applies to all things of a particular kind, although they have not considered all the relevant facts carefully.
     It is far too early to make sweeping statements about gene therapy.
     现在对基因疗法下结论还为时过早。

• identify
  找出，发现
     Scientists have identified a lik between diet and cancer.
     科学家发现了饮食与癌症之间的关联。

• care home
  为有特殊需求人群设立的护理中心

• ebb
  1）海水的退潮，落潮，可做名词或动词
     …… the ebb and flow of the seasons
     四季的更迭
  2）衰退，减轻，减弱
     The pain was ebbing.
     疼痛逐渐减轻了。
     As night fell, our enthusiasm began to ebb away.
     我们的热情随着夜晚的降临而渐渐低落下来。

• fraught with
  充满（通常为不愉快的）的，有点类似于be filled with ....
     a situation fraught with danger/difficulty/problems
     充满危险/困难重重/问题成堆的局面

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The evidence so far suggests that the British government played a bad hand badly. The country was always going to struggle. The virus took off in London, an international hub. Britain has a high proportion of ethnic-minority people, who are especially vulnerable to the disease. And Britons are somewhat overweight, which exacerbates the impact of the infection.

目前为止，有证据表明英国政府极其地不走运。这个国家一直在挣扎。病毒在国际中心—伦敦爆发。英国有着很多的少数人种，而这些人尤其容易患病。并且英国人稍微有点过胖了，而这也加剧了感染的影响力。

• bad hand
  可以理解为棋牌中的“烂牌”，引申为不占优势的环境，或者缺陷等。

• to be dealt a good/bad hand
  拿到一手好牌/烂牌

• vulnerable to
  易感染某种疾病的，易患病的。
     People with high blood pressure are especially vulnerable to diabetes……
     有高血压的人尤其容易患糖尿病

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Britain has got some things right. Its researchers have been in the forefront of the race to find drugs and create vaccines against the disease. On June 16th a trial by Oxford University, the first to identify a life-saving medicine, showed that a cheap steroid can reduce mortality among the sickest patients by a third. A swift reorganisation of the National Health Service put paid to fears that it would be overwhelmed. But the government has wasted the most precious commodity in a crisis: time. In a federal system, like America’s, the central government’s failings can be mitigated by state and local authorities. In a centralised system, they cannot.

但是英国还是做好了一些事情的。在制作医药和发明疫苗来抗击疫情方面，它的研究人员一直处在最前沿的位置。在6月16日，首次发现救命医药的牛津大学开展了一场试验，结果表明一种便宜的类固醇能够把那些最严重患者的死亡率降低三分之一。而国际健康服务这个组织的迅速重建也消除了那些担心它会被压垮的忧虑。但是政府还是浪费了这场危机中最宝贵的资源：时间。在一个联邦系统中，比如美国，中央政府的过失是能够被各个州和地方机构减轻的。然而这在一个中央集权的系统中，却无法做到。

• in/at the forefront of
  1）在……最前沿，处在前列
     Prison conditions have been pushed to the forefront of public debate.
     监狱条件已经被推到公众讨论的最前列。
  2）（思考或关注的）重心，焦点
     The court case was constantly in the forefront of my mind/attention.
     这个诉讼案件一直萦绕在我的心头。

• put paid to sth
  使某事落空，破坏某事的计划。英文解释为：to stop something from happening or spoil plans for something
     Bad exam results put paid to his hopesof a uniersity place.
     糟糕的考试成绩让他上大学的希望破灭了。

• mitigate
  减轻，缓和，缓解，英文解释为：to mitigate something means to make it less unpleasant,serious, or painful. 与alleviate意思相近。
     ……action to mitigate poverty
     减轻贫穷的行动

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Hindsight is a fine thing, and offers a clarity that is absent in the blizzard of events. Yet it is now plain that Britain’s scientists initially argued for the wrong approach: accepting that the disease would spread through the population, while protecting the vulnerable and the health service. Neil Ferguson, an epidemiologist at Imperial College London, estimates that had Britain locked down a week earlier, at least half of the 50,000-or-so lives that have been lost would have been saved. This is more Britons than have died in any event since the second world war.

事后的领悟是很有好处的，并且提供了在棘手事件中所缺失的清晰思路和条理。但是现在很明显，英国科学家一开始就主张了错误的方式，即一方面赞同这场疫情会通过群众传播，但是另一方却又不去保护那些易感人群和健康服务。伦敦皇家学院的流行病专家Neil Ferguson曾经预测：如果英国能够早一周开始封锁，大约5万的死亡者中至少有一半能够存活。而这是自二战以来死亡人数最多的一次事件。

• hindsight
  事后聪明，事后的领悟，接地气一点可以翻译成“马后炮”。英文解释为：the understanding that you have of a situation only after it has happened and that means you would have done things in a different way.
     What looks obvious in hindsight was not at all obvious at the time.
     事后一目了然的事在当时根本看不清。
     With hindsight, I should have seen the warning signs.
     事后想来，我应该看见警告的迹象的。

• epidemiologist
  流行病学家。这里想说一下和它同词源的名词epidemic。
  1）流行病
  与pandemic类似，也表示流行病，但pandemic倾向于指更大范围的传播，而epedemic相对传播区域较小。一般现在某个地方出现了epidemic，然后开始越来越严重，最后发展成了pandemic。
  2）（迅速的）蔓延，传播，泛滥
     th epidemic of laziness……
     懒惰的盛行

• blizzard of
  blizzard原意指的是大风雪，暴风雪，比我们说的snow storm要严重的多。blizzard of类似于a series of，但是它多指不那么令人愉快的事物。
     The White House received a blizzard of phone calls.
     白宫接到连续不断的电话。

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