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| Until recently, China, the world’s most populous nation, was also the world’s last Covid holdout. But in a matter of weeks it will be hit by a wave that a top health official predicts could infect many hundreds of millions of people. | 作为全球第一人口大国，中国直到最近都仍是世界上最后一个坚持抵抗新冠的国家。但在未来几周，中国将迎来一大波疫情的冲击，一名高级卫生官员预测可能会有多达数亿人感染。 |
| This week, Beijing took its biggest step toward living with Covid, all but abandoning an unpopular and costly “zero Covid” policy of lockdowns and mass quarantines it had hoped would eliminate infections. The abrupt pivot has raised the specter of tremendous strain on a health care system that is overstretched even in normal times. That could get worse in a month, when people travel across the country to see their families during the Lunar New Year holiday. | 本周，北京朝着与新冠共存迈出了最重大的一步，彻底放弃了不受欢迎且代价高昂的“新冠清零”政策，即通过封锁和大规模隔离来达到清除感染的目的。这一急转弯引发了对医疗系统压力过大的担忧，即便在常态下，医疗系统也已经处于超负荷运转状态。一个月后情况可能变得更糟，届时全国各地的民众都将在春节期间踏上探亲的旅途。 |
| Feng Zijian, an adviser on China’s Covid task force, said this week that the surge could infect 60 percent of the country’s 1.4 billion population — or more than 840 million people. For most Chinese, it will be their first encounter with Covid. | 中国新冠防控专家组的顾问冯子健本周表示，这波激增的疫情可能会感染全国14亿人口的60%，即超过8.4亿人。对于大多数中国人来说，这将是他们第一次接触新冠病毒。 |
| Like many countries, China is now facing Omicron variants that are highly infectious, but have so far been milder than earlier iterations. Unlike the rest of the world, China had nearly three years to prepare for this surge. But it spent most of that time focusing on lockdowns instead of on vaccinations and preparing the population for living with Covid, a prospect that many experts had warned would be inevitable. | 与许多国家一样，中国如今面临奥密克戎变异株的威胁，这种病毒具有高传染性，但目前要比此前的变异株更加温和。与全世界不同的是，中国有近三年的时间来为感染激增做好准备。但它把大部分时间都花在了封控而非疫苗接种之上，未能帮助民众做好与新冠共存的准备，哪怕许多专家都警告过，这样的结果不可避免。 |
| “A tsunami of cases is coming no matter if they stick to zero Covid or not,” said Jin Dong-Yan, a virologist at Hong Kong University. | “无论他们是否坚持新冠清零，都会出现大量感染，”香港大学病毒学家金冬雁说。 |
| The question is how many cases will become severe and require more serious medical attention. Even the current picture is unclear. According to official data released by the National Health Commission, there were 159 severe cases of Covid nationwide by Friday, an increase of about 60 from the start of the month. | 问题在于有多少感染者会发展为重症，需要更多医疗护理。甚至连当下情形都并不明朗。根据国家卫健委公布的官方数据，截至周五，全国共有159例重症患者，比本月初增加了约60例。 |
| “That number is still very low because in reality there should be many more confirmed cases that are going underreported now,” Mr. Jin said. Another difficulty: the definition of a “severe” case can vary from one city to another, he added. | “这个数字还是很低，因为实际上现在应该有很多确诊病例被漏报，”金冬雁说。他还补充说，另一个难点在于，对“重症”的定义可能因地而异。 |
| What is clear is that the government is bracing for the wave to be big. Officials on Friday announced plans to double the capacity of critical care beds and to increase the number of doctors and nurses staffing such wards. Also in the works: to upgrade temporary facilities previously built to quarantine people deemed close contacts, turning them into secondary hospitals. Officials additionally said that workers at the community level would classify residents by risk level — assigning color codes denoting risk based on vaccination status, age, and other health conditions, a shift away from surveillance that had tracked residents based on contact tracing and infections. | 可以确定的是，政府正在为这波感染巨浪做准备。官方周五宣布，计划将医院的重症监护床位容量翻一倍，并为其增加医护人手。此外还要升级以往为隔离密接者建造的临时设施，将其改为亚定点医院。官员们还表示，社区工作人员将划分居民风险级别，根据疫苗接种情况、年龄和其他健康状况，为其分配不同颜色的标记，代表不同程度的风险，不再依据密接追踪和感染情况监测居民。 |
| China wants to ration hospital beds for the most severe cases, but officials now need to convince the majority of infected people to stay home, despite having told them for years to fear Covid. A triage system has been set up to funnel Covid patients to community health centers, but most people are unaccustomed to seeing a doctor outside the hospital. The government is relying on an army of volunteers to field phone calls and deliver cold medicine and Covid test kits to the sick at home, but there are already early signs of understaffing and of shortages of the necessary supplies. | 中国希望将医院床位留给病情最重的感染者，但几年来一直在渲染新冠恐惧的官员们现在要做的，是说服大多数感染者居家隔离。将新冠患者安排至社区卫生中心就诊的分流机制已经建立，但大多数民众并不习惯去医院以外的地方看病。政府依靠大批志愿者拨打电话，为居家病例送去感冒药品和新冠病毒检测试剂盒，但已有初步迹象表明人手配备不足，必要用品也出现短缺。 |
| To some extent, the complications China is facing as it opens up are not unique. Other countries that have shifted from strict pandemic controls to adapting to the virus have experienced some level of shock as people unused to the virus flooded hospitals for help. But in places like Singapore and New Zealand, that change was more controlled. Officials removed restrictions only after telling the public what to expect and when, allowing hospital systems more time to prepare for the oncoming surge, and citizens more time to get vaccinated. | 某种程度上，中国在开放过程中面临的复杂情况并不特殊。从严防疫情转向适应病毒的国家都经历了一定的冲击，因为不习惯病毒的民众会涌入医院寻求帮助。但在新加坡和新西兰等地，转变是比较可控的。官员们在告知公众未来将出现何种情况之后才放松了管制，让医院系统有更多时间为即将到来的感染激增做准备，也让公民有更多时间完成疫苗接种。 |
| “Singapore adopted a cautious approach with a gradual opening up,” said Paul Anantharajah Tambyah, a practicing infectious diseases doctor and president of the Asia Pacific Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infection. Mild and moderate cases were treated outside of the hospital system, he added. “That helped communications a lot and was easier for the general population to accept than a dramatic shift towards a ‘business as usual’ approach.” | “新加坡采取了逐步放开的谨慎办法，”执业传染病医师兼亚太临床微生物学及感染病会主席保罗·安纳塔拉贾·坦比亚说。他还表示，轻度和中度病例都得在医院系统之外接受治疗。“这对沟通大有助益，对大众来说也比‘一切恢复如常’那种急转弯更易于接受。” |
| China is only now trying to step up a vaccination campaign that had mostly stalled in the spring as resources were diverted to building and enforcing a national mass testing system. More than 600 million vaccinated people have not yet received a booster shot, a necessary prerequisite to prevent serious cases among those given the Chinese vaccines, which have been proven to be weaker, according to the World Health Organization. Among those 80 and older, only 40 percent have had booster vaccinations. | 中国现在才开始加速疫苗接种，由于资源都被转移到全国性大规模检测系统的建设和执行之上，这项工作在春季已基本停滞。根据世界卫生组织的数据，中国有超过6亿疫苗接种者尚未注射加强针，这是预防接种已被证明防护力较弱的中国疫苗的人出现严重病例的必要先决条件。在80岁及以上的人群中，只有40%的人接种了加强针。 |
| After the loosening was announced on Wednesday, officials hastened to write new guidelines on everything from home isolation to rapid antigen testing and to free up resources for a coming deluge of cases. | 在周三宣布放松后，官员们匆忙编写了从居家隔离到抗原检测在内的各种新规定，并为即将到来的大规模感染腾出资源。 |
| Dale Fisher, a professor of medicine and the head of the National Infection Prevention and Control Committee of Singapore’s Health Ministry, said that Chinese health officials would need to ensure that extra hospital beds were ready, ventilators on hand and medical staff redeployed. | 医学教授兼新加坡卫生部国家感染防控委员会主席戴尔·费舍尔表示，中国卫生官员必须准备好更多病床、随时可用的呼吸机，并对医务人员进行调动。 |
| China has moved quickly in recent days to do this, more than doubling its intensive care bed capacity to 10 beds per 100,000 people, up from less than four just a month ago. | 中国近来迅速采取行动，将重症监护床位的数量增加了一倍多，从一个月前的每10万人不到四张增加到了10张。 |
| The National Health Commission on Friday also said it could redirect 106,000 doctors and 177,700 nurses to intensive care units. According to the most recent official figures reported in 2020, China has three registered nurses for every 1,000 people and two practicing physicians for every 1,000 people. | 国家卫健委周五还表示，可能将106000名医生和177700名护士调至重症监护病房工作。根据最近于2020年公布的官方数据，中国为每千人服务的注册护士为三人，执业医师则为两人。 |
| Some of the changes have created confusion as authorities act quickly in response to new measures. In cities like Beijing and Shanghai, the authorities removed many testing booths almost as soon as the new guidelines on Wednesday called for testing requirements to be limited. But by Friday, the National Health Commission said that testing sites should not be arbitrarily removed, and that they should be made available for those who need to enter nursing homes and medical facilities, where a negative test result is still required. | 随着当局对新措施迅速作出反应，一些变动带来了混乱。在北京、上海等城市，周三要求减少核酸检测的新规刚下达，当局就拆除了许多检测点。但到周五，国家卫健委又表示不应随意拆除检测点，这些检测点应为那些必须进入仍需核酸阴性证明的养老院和医疗机构的人开放。 |
| As cases mount in Beijing, many people have been lining up at hospitals and laying in supplies of fever-reducing medication and home test kits. Some city residents reported that hospitals were turning away people with symptoms, telling them that their cases must first be reported by local neighborhood officials. | 随着北京的感染增加，许多人在医院排起长队购买退烧药和家用检测试剂盒。一些城市的居民报告说，医院拒绝接诊有症状的人，告知他们阳性病例必须先由街道官员报告。 |
| Wakeman Wang, a resident in Beijing, said he had hoped to take his 7-year-old son to see a doctor after he had briefly choked on a fish bone earlier this week. But the boy had tested positive for Covid. Mr. Wang’s local neighborhood worker — tasked with overseeing pandemic policies at the community level — told him health workers were unable to arrange a closed-loop transfer to a hospital and suggested that Mr. Wang either take the child to the hospital by himself or call family doctors. | 北京居民韦克曼·王说，他七岁的儿子本周早些时候被鱼骨卡了喉咙，他想带儿子看医生，但儿子的核酸结果是阳性。负责监督社区防疫政策的居委会工作人员告诉他，医务人员无法安排就医的闭环转诊，建议他要么自己带孩子去医院，要么致电家庭医生。 |
| Mr. Wang said his wife tried calling several local family doctors who had been quickly assembled to help sort out community medical issues, but none of the numbers she tried worked. | 韦克曼·王说他的妻子试着给当地好几位家庭医生打电话，这些医生曾被迅速召集起来帮助解决社区医疗问题，但没有一个号码能打通。 |
| “I felt desperate and guilty,” he said. “When my child was in danger, I couldn’t solve the problem, and I couldn’t ensure his safety.” | “我很绝望也很内疚，”韦克曼·王说。“当我的孩子遇到危险，我却没法解决问题，也没法确保他的安全。” |
| Scarlet Zhang, a resident in Fengtai, a district in the city’s southwest, said she tried to go to a hospital after testing positive with a fever of 100 degrees Fahrenheit. | 北京市西南部丰台区居民斯佳丽·张说，她在检测呈阳性且发烧近38摄氏度之后试图前往医院就医。 |
| She said she tried several times to call an ambulance, but the municipal emergency number, comparable to 911 in the United States, was always busy. A pharmacy near her home was out of fever medication, she said. | 她说自己叫了好几次救护车，但打120总是占线。她说她家附近一家药店已经没有退烧药了。 |
| “It is my third day having a fever, I cannot get advice from a professional, and I don’t know what to do now,” she said. | “我都发烧三天了，没有专业人士给我建议，我现在不知道该怎么办，”她说。 |
| Because of the hard line previously taken on the severity of the virus, Chinese officials now face a big challenge to assuage the public’s fears, Mr. Fisher said. | 费舍尔表示，由于此前对病毒严重性的不妥协立场，中国官员如今的巨大挑战在于如何缓解公众的恐惧心理。 |
| “The messaging to the public is really tricky when you’ve been saying for two to three years that this is deadly, and now you are saying, ‘If you get it, just stay home and isolate yourself,’” he added. | “两三年来一直宣称病毒是致命的，现在却说‘感染了就在家里自我隔离’，让公众接受这种信息难度是很大的，”他补充道。 |
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