外刊精读01 新冠肺炎引发的思考

We're Not Ready for This      from businessweek

In the evolutionary arms race between humanity and the microbes,the bugs are making a comeback.Yes,we've conquered diseases suck as smallpox and polio,and deaths from communicable diseases have been falling worldwide.But since 1970,more than 1,500 new pathogens have been discovered,according to the World Health Organization,and "epidemics in the 21st century are spreading faster and father than ever.Outbreaks  that were previously localized can now become global very rapidly."

arms race  军备竞赛      bug 细菌、病毒     

comeback 卷土重来，复出    常用表达：make a comeback

第一句用来描述人类与微生物的长期关系：互相竞争，并指明微生物正在卷土重来；我们可以在表达人与自然关系、有竞争性质的事物时套用。比如：In the drastic arms race between humanity and nature,nature is making comeback

smallpox 天花  pilio 小儿麻痹症  pathogen 病原体

第二句以yes开头，先肯定了人类与微生物战争中取得的成绩，然后又用but引出了新的挑战，最后借用WHO之言引出当前面临的形势 “spreading faster,becoming global”

翻译（仅参考）：在人类和微生物进化的“军备竞赛”中，病毒正在卷土重来。是的，我们已经战胜了诸如天花和小儿麻痹症等疾病并且来自于传染病的死亡已经在全球范围内下降。但是，据世界卫生组织（表示），自从1970年以来，人类已经发现了超过1500种新的病原体，“21世纪的流行病比从前传播的更快更远，之前的局部爆发现在已经快速的全球化”

整个第一段一方面肯定积极的因素，另一方面引出新的挑战，最后通过引用突出当前流行病的传播特点。在我们写作论证时，可以采用这样的方法。

In late 2002 an airborne illness,dubbed severe acute respiratory syndrome,emerged in China's southern Guangdong province ,then quickly spread across the the border and killed 774 people from Asia to Canada. In 2009 a novel influenza virus, H1N1, advanced worldwide in nine weeks and may have resulted in as many as 575,000 fatalities. The new virus from central China that’s sparked global alarm, a coronavirus known as 2019-nCoV and a close cousin to SARS,reached four continents in about five weeks.

第二段由古到今，描写了几种流行病的发生。同位语+定语从句做后置定语+动词  来简洁描述事物的特点及发展变化。

翻译：2002年末，一种被称作急性呼吸综合征的空气传播性疾病出现在中国南部的广州省，之后快速地跨国界传播，从亚洲到加拿大，导致774人死亡。2009年，一种新型的流感病毒H1N1,在9周内全球全球蔓延，可能最终导致了57500例死亡。来自于中国中部的新型病毒，2019-nCoV冠状病毒，是SARS的近亲，在五周内到达四个大陆，引发了全球警惕。

As newer threats surface, such as Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) in 2012, older scourges like cholera, plague,and yellow fever flare up with disturbing regularity. Even worse, the antibiotics that revolutionized health care in the last century are losing their punch as new strains of infectious diseases, especially tuberculosis, become more resistant to multidrug treatments. “We’ve created an interconnected,dynamically changing world that provides innumerable opportunities to microbes,” says Richard Hatchett, a former U.S. adviser on public health emergencies and head of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations in Oslo. “If there’s weakness anywhere, there’s weakness everywhere.”

scourge:灾难，使陷于水生火热  cholera:霍乱   antibiotic  抗生素

flare up:(of flames,a fire,etc)to suddenly start burning more brightly;(of an illness,injury)suddenly start  again or become worse（强调 again）

strain:（熟词僻义）病菌的类型，品种，品系

tuberculosis：肺结核

lose one's punch：可以意译（体会意思）

这一段紧随第二段，以递进关系突出了当前更糟糕的形势，最后通过引用一名官员的话来突出这些缺陷带来的后果。

翻译：在新的威胁暴露的同时，例如2012年的中东呼吸综合证，像霍乱、鼠疫以及黄热病等更老的灾祸随着监管混乱再一次爆发。更糟糕的是，随着新型传染性疾病，尤其是肺结核，对多药物疗法更有抗性，在上个世纪给健康带来彻底改革的抗生素正在失去作用。（职位略去）Richard Hatchett说“我们已经创造了一个相互连接，动态变化的世界，其为微生物带来了不计其数的机会，如果有一个地方有缺陷，每一个地方都会有缺陷”。