2020年经济学人 疫情与口罩(2)（在线收听）

Although scientists cannot experiment on human beings deliberately,

虽然科学家无法蓄意对人类进行实验，

some wonder if the world is now carrying out a natural experiment that tests the value of mask-wearing.

但一些人想知道世界是否正在进行天然实验，测试戴口罩的价值。

In many East Asian countries it was common practice to sport masks, even before covid-19, to protect against respiratory diseases and pollution.

在很多东亚国家中，甚至在covid-19出现之前，佩戴口罩是一种常见做法，以防止呼吸道疾病和污染。

A lot of people in these places therefore took immediately to wearing masks when the epidemic started.

因此这些国家中的很多人在疫情开始时，就立即戴上了口罩。

Countries that adopted masks early on did not, by and large, shut their economies down.

总的来说，早期采取佩戴口罩措施的国家并没有让经济停下来。

Yet they suppressed the disease more effectively than those that locked down but did not wear masks.

然而，他们比那些实施了封锁但不戴口罩的国家更有效地抑制了疾病。

In the West nobody normally wears a mask, though the practice is spreading.

在西方，通常没人会佩戴口罩，尽管这种做法慢慢普及。

Universal masking started in the Czech Republic after Petr Ludwig, a Czech YouTube star,

3月14日，捷克YouTube网红Petr Ludwig发视频建议戴口罩，该视频走红网络，

posted a video on March 14th recommending the practice, and it went viral. Other social-media influencers posted pictures of themselves wearing masks.

捷克共和国佩戴口罩开始普及。其他社交媒体网红上传了自己佩戴口罩的照片。

"Mask trees", where people would bang homemade masks for others to use, sprang up on street comers.

“口罩树”在各个街角涌现，人们可以击下树上的口罩供他人使用。

By March 19th masks were mandatory in the country. Slovakia and Slovenia followed swiftly.

到3月19日，该国已强制规定佩戴口罩。斯洛伐克和斯洛文尼亚紧随其后。

In Britain the government advises people to wear masks, but to little effect. On the London Underground around a third of travellers do so.

在英国，政府建议大家佩戴口罩，但效果甚微。在伦敦地铁上，大约有三分之一的乘客这样做。

On the Paris metro where people risk a 135 euros fine if they fail to cover their faces, everybody does.

在巴黎地铁上，如果没有遮住面部就要面临135欧元的罚款，每个人都戴了口罩。

In America the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, which previously recommended mask-wearing only for health workers, changed its mind in early April.

在美国，疾病控制和预防中心之前只建议医护人员戴口罩，但在4月初改变了主意。

It now recommends that everybody should wear them in places where it is hard for people to stay far enough apart.

现在其建议每个人都应该在难以保持距离的地方佩戴口罩。

Several states have passed regulations along those lines, as has New York City. But, as Governor Burgum noted, the rows go on.

一些州已经通过了类似的法规，纽约市也是如此。但就像柏格姆州长所指出的，争吵还在继续。