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Vaccine hesitancy produces a terrible toll. In Japan, a fall in the numbers of people taking the HPV vaccine in 2013 (owing to coverage of a cluster of adverse effects) is predicted to lead to 5,000 deaths from cervical cancer that could otherwise have been prevented. As well as exposing people to illness and death, vaccine reluctance and outright anti-vaccine propagandists prevent eradication of diseases.
“疫苗猶豫”會造成可怕的后果。在日本，2013年接種宮頸癌疫苗的人數下降(由于覆蓋了一系列不良反應)，預計將導致5000人死于本可以避免的宮頸癌。不愿接種疫苗和公然反對接種疫苗的宣傳者不僅使人們暴露在疾病和死亡面前，還阻礙了疾病的根除。
The WHO included on its 2019 list, with admirable foresight, a threat labelled "disease X". Effectively they left a blank space that "represents the need to prepare for an unknown pathogen that could cause a serious epidemic" – a blank space duly filled the following year by Sars-CoV-2, which (almost certainly) crossed from bats and started spreading between humans.
世界衛生組織以令人欽佩的遠見，將一種名為“X疾病”的威脅列入了2019年的名單。實際上，他們留下了空白，“代表著需要為可能導致嚴重流行病的未知病原體做好準備”。第二年，Sars-CoV-2(非典)適時填補了這一空白，它(幾乎可以肯定)從蝙蝠身上傳播并開始在人類之間傳播。
Actually, it was quite predictable that a serious disease would cross over from animals. Other examples include HIV, rabies, anthrax, Ebola, flu, Mers and Sars (both from the coronavirus family) and bubonic plague. All of these are zoonotic diseases that jumped from animals. A lesser-known zoonotic virus, Nipah, is of serious concern. It crossed from fruit bats to pigs to humans and was first picked up in the Malaysian village of Nipah in 1999. It has a shocking death rate of between 40% and 75% (compared with 3% for coronavirus).
事實上，可以預見的是，一種嚴重的疾病會從動物身上傳染過來。其他例子包括艾滋病毒、狂犬病、炭疽熱、埃博拉病毒、流感、中東呼吸綜合征和非典(均來自冠狀病毒家族)以及黑死病。這些都是從動物身上傳播的人畜共患疾病。一種鮮為人知的人畜共患病毒尼帕引起了嚴重關注。它從果蝠身上傳播到豬身上再傳播到人身上，并于1999年在馬來西亞的尼帕村首次被發現。它的死亡率令人震驚，在40%到75%之間(相比之下，冠狀病毒的死亡率為3%)。
There is no treatment or vaccine, and if the virus mutated and became more easily transmitted between people – well, you can see the problem. We need an international institute for pandemic protection and response, perhaps working under the umbrella of the WHO.
目前沒有治療方法或者疫苗，如果病毒發生變異，變得更容易在人與人之間傳播——嗯，你就能看到問題的嚴重性了。我們需要一個“國際大流行保護和應對機構”，或許可以在世衛組織的保護傘下開展工作。
In 2009, when the H1N1 swine flu pandemic threatened to take hold, the vaccines that were developed for it were snapped up by rich countries. Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, is an international body that subsidises the cost of vaccines so poorer countries can afford them, and this is something we should do for any coronavirus vaccine, if it is not done by the goodwill of world governments (and we can't rely on that). We should also support the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (Cepi), an organisation working on vaccines for many emerging diseases, including Covid-19. Cepi has an immediate need for $2bn to complete vaccine trials, but then more to ramp up manufacturing capacity to make sure there is enough vaccine for everyone who needs it.
2009年，當H1N1豬流感大流行威脅要爆發時，針對它開發的疫苗被富裕國家搶購一空。疫苗聯盟Gavi是一個國際機構，它為疫苗的成本提供補貼，讓較貧窮的國家能夠負擔得起。如果說世界各國政府拿不出善意，那么對于任何冠狀病毒疫苗我們都應該這樣做(我們不能依賴這一點)。我們還應該支持流行病防范創新聯盟(Cepi)，這是一個致力于為包括新冠在內的許多新發疾病研制疫苗的組織。Cepi迫切需要20億美元來完成疫苗試驗，但還需要更多資金來提高生產能力以確保有足夠的疫苗滿足所有需要之人。
