2020年经济学人 从政治角度看疫情(1)（在线收听）

Leaders

来源于3月14日《社论》版块

The politics of pandemics

流行病下的政治

All governments will struggle. Some will struggle more than others

所有的政府都将举步维艰。有些则特为尤甚

To see what is to come look to Lombardy, the affluent Italian region at the heart of the covid-19 outbreak in Europe. Its hospitals provide world-class health care. Until last week they thought they would cope with the disease—then waves of people began turning up with pneumonia. Having run out of ventilators and oxygen, exhausted staff at some hospitals are being forced to leave untreated patients to die.

要想知道接下来会发生什么，那就去伦巴第看看吧。伦巴第是富裕的意大利地区，是欧洲covid-19疫情的中心。该地区医院提供世界级的医疗保健。直到上个星期，他们还以为自己能对付这种疾病——然后一波又一波的人开始出现肺炎。一些医院的呼吸器和氧气已经用完，精疲力竭的工作人员不得不眼睁睁看看得不到治疗的病人死去。

The pandemic, as the World Health Organisation (WHO) officially declared it this week, is spreading fast, with almost 45,000 cases and nearly 1,500 deaths in 112 countries outside China. Epidemiologists reckon Italy is one or two weeks ahead of places like Spain, France, America and Britain. Less-connected countries, such as Egypt and India, are further behind, but not much.

本周，世界卫生组织正式宣布，covid-19正在迅速蔓延，在中国以外的112个国家，已有近4.5万例确诊病例和近1500人死亡。流行病学家估计，意大利比西班牙、法国、美国和英国早一两个星期。像埃及和印度这样联系不那么紧密的国家则要慢得多，但相差并不多。

Few of today’s political leaders have ever faced anything like a pandemic and its economic fallout—though some are evoking the financial crisis of 2007-09. As they belatedly realise that health systems will buckle and deaths mount, leaders are at last coming to terms with the fact that they will have to weather the storm. Three factors will determine how they cope: their attitude to uncertainty; the structure and competence of their health systems; and, above all, whether they are trusted.

当今的政治领袖中，很少有人曾面临过诸如流行病及其所带来的经济后果这样的事情——尽管有些人正回想起2007-09年的金融危机。当领导者们终于意识到卫生系统将会崩溃，死亡人数将会上升时，他们终于接受了必须经受住这场风暴的事实。有三个因素将决定他们如何应对：他们对不确定性的态度；卫生系统的结构和能力；以及最重要的是，他们是否受到信任。