中國新聞組／北京10日電 2020年04月10日
「自然」雜誌9日發表社論「停止新冠病毒的污名化」。(自然雜誌官網截圖) 
新冠肺炎導致分布世界各地的亞裔遭受歧視。圖為倫敦唐人街附近的中餐館。(美聯社) 國際科學期刊「自然」為該刊先前在報導中將新冠病毒與武漢及中國連結道歉。「自然」期刊表示，該刊和其他媒體的早期報導，引發亞洲人在世界各地遭到種族歧視攻擊。 環球網報導，9日出版的最新一期「自然」，社評題為「停止新冠病毒的污名化」（Stop the coronavirus stigma now）。文章表示，疫症大流行之際，令人震驚的種族主義和歧視甚囂塵上，尤其是針對亞洲人的歧視，教育和科研將為此付出代價。該文強調：「新冠病毒污名化必須停止——刻不容緩。」 「自然」雜誌微信公眾號「Nature自然科研」4月9日發表社論「停止新冠病毒的污名化」指出，今年2月，世衛組織宣布將新型冠狀病毒引起的疾病命名為「COVID19」，這一名字很快便被傳播公共衛生信息的大小組織採用。世衛組織在提出這個命名的時候，委婉地提醒了一下曾經在新聞報導中錯誤地將新冠病毒與武漢和中國關聯在一起的人和組織，包括「自然」。我們當初的做法確實有誤，我們願為此承擔責任並道歉。 該社論指出，但是，在各國努力控制新冠病毒傳播之際，少數政客卻依然抱守舊辭不放。美國總統川普一再將新冠病毒與中國關聯在一起。其他地區的政客，包括英國在內，也在說中國應為此負責。 該社論說，執意將一種病毒及其所致疾病與某個地方關聯在一起，是一種不負責任的行為，需要立即停止。 做不到這一點會造成嚴重後果。顯而易見的是，自從新冠肺炎疫情暴發以來，世界各地的亞裔成為了種族主義攻擊的對象，產生了難以計數的人力代價，包括對他們身心健康和谋生方式造成的損失。執法機構表示正在重點調查仇恨犯罪，但是這些行動對於一些人來說可能為時已晚——包括70多萬在海外學習的中國本科生、碩士生和博士生中的大部分人。 關於是否要回國，這些學生左右為難：一方面害怕繼續遭受種族歧視，一方面擔心未來學業的不確定性，加上國際航班的恢復時間也未知。 該社論稱，如果新冠病毒引起的污名化導致亞洲年輕人離開國際校園，縮短教育時間，放棄自己和他人的機會，讓科研環境每況愈下——在這個世界依賴科研尋求出路之際，將不啻為一個悲劇。「新冠病毒污名化必須停止——刻不容緩」。
Chinatown in San Francisco, California, during coronavirus: China sends some 400,000 students to the United States. How many will return once lockdowns are lifted?Credit: Jeff Chiu/AP/Shutterstock When the World Health Organization (WHO) announced in February that the disease caused by the new coronavirus would be called COVID‑19, the name was quickly adopted by organizations involved in communicating public-health information. As well as naming the illness, the WHO was implicitly sending a reminder to those who had erroneously been associating the virus with Wuhan and with China in their news coverage— including Nature. That we did so was an error on our part, for which we take responsibility and apologize. For years, it was common for viral diseases to be associated with the landscapes, places or regions where the first outbreaks occurred — as in Middle East respiratory syndrome, or Zika virus, named after a forest in Uganda. But in 2015, the WHO introduced guidelines to stop this practice and thereby reduce stigma and negative impacts such as fear or anger directed towards those regions or their people. The guidelines underlined the point that viruses infect all humans: when an outbreak happens, everyone is at risk, regardless of who they are or where they are from.
And yet, as countries struggle to control the spread of the new coronavirus, a minority of politicians are sticking with the outdated script. US President Donald Trump has repeatedly associated the virus with China. Brazilian lawmaker Eduardo Bolsonaro — the son of President Jair Bolsonaro — has called it “China’s fault”. Politicians elsewhere, including in the United Kingdom, are also saying that China bears responsibility. Continuing to associate a virus and the disease it causes with a specific place is irresponsible and needs to stop. As infectious-disease epidemiologist Adam Kucharski reminds us in his timely book The Rules of Contagion, published in February, history tells us that pandemics lead to communities being stigmatized, which is why we all need to exercise more care. If in doubt, seek advice, and always fall back on the consensus of the evidence. Racist attacksFailing to do so has consequences. It’s clear that since the outbreak was first reported, people of Asian descent around the world have been subjected to racist attacks, with untold human costs — for example, on their health and livelihoods. Law-enforcement agencies say they are making investigation of hate crimes a high priority, but such inquiries might come too late for some, including many of the more than 700,000 Chinese undergraduate, master’s and PhD students studying at universities outside China. The majority are in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. Many have returned home while their institutions are closed owing to lockdowns, and many might not return. Students are hesitating to come back, in part because of fears of continuing racism, along with uncertainty over the future of their courses and not knowing when international travel will resume. These young people will experience disruption and the loss of new connections and opportunities. But the loss of students from China and other countries in Asia has wide-ranging -and worrying implications for the scholarly enterprise, too. It means that universities in the affected countries will become less diverse — something that has not happened for generations. A loss for allFor decades, campuses have striven to boost diversity, and countries have enacted policies to encourage international academic mobility. Diversity is valuable for its own sake. It encourages understanding and dialogue between cultures, and sharing of points of view and ways of being. And it has always been a fuel for research and innovation.
Moreover, a diverse campus body is needed to improve policies and structures so that universities — and research publishing — can become more welcoming. Many barriers to diversity remain: in the April issue of Nature Reviews Physics, for example, researchers and science communicators from China, India, Japan and South Korea report examples of discrimination and other factors that prevent them being heard in international journals (S. Hanasoge et al. Nature Rev. Phys. 2, 178–180; 2020). Many leaders want to listen to and act on expert scientific advice to deal with this pandemic and save lives. On terminology, the advice is clear: we must all do everything we can to avoid and reduce stigma; not associate COVID-19 with particular groups of people or places; and emphasize that viruses do not discriminate — we are all at risk. It would be tragic if stigma, fuelled by the coronavirus, led Asia’s young people to retreat from international campuses, curtailing their own education, reducing their own and others’ opportunities and leaving research worse off — just when the world is relying on it to find a way out. Coronavirus stigma must stop — now.
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