2月11日,世界卫生组织总干事谭德塞宣布,将新型冠状病毒感染的肺炎命名为“COVID-19”。
"We now have a name for the disease and it's COVID-19," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters in Geneva.
在日内瓦,世界卫生组织总干事谭德塞对记者表示:“我们将这个疾病命名为COVID-19。”
这个名字COVID-19来源于corona(冠状)、virus(病毒)以及disease(疾病)三个词,而19则代表这个疾病出现的年份2019年。新冠肺炎疫情是在2019年12月31日上报至世界卫生组织的。
谭德塞指出:
"We had to find a name that did not refer to a geographical location, an animal, an individual or group of people, and which is also pronounceable and related to the disease," the WHO chief said.
我们要取的名字不能指向某个地理位置、某个动物、某个人或群体,同时这个名字要易读,且与该疾病相关。
"Having a name matters to prevent the use of other names that can be inaccurate or stigmatizing. It also gives us a standard format to use for any future coronavirus outbreaks."
正式命名可以阻止其他不准确或者污名化名称的使用,同时,也让我们在今后的冠状病毒疫情命名时有标准可循。
新型冠状病毒名称为SARS-CoV-2
The virus itself has been designated SARS-CoV-2 by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses.
新型冠状病毒的名称则由国际病毒分类委员会指定为SARS-CoV-2。
冠状病毒(coronavirus)是一个病毒大家族,其中包括引起普通感冒的病毒,以及曾经造成重大疫情的:
► 严重急性呼吸综合征(Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome,SARS)冠状病毒;
► 中东呼吸综合征(Middle East Respiratory Syndrome,MERS)冠状病毒。
此前,世界卫生组织建议使用的临时名称,英文叫“2019-nCoV”。2019指代病毒被发现的年份,后面的nCoV是“新型冠状病毒”英文翻译new/novel coronavirus的缩写。
为什么给病毒起名讲究这么多?
美国约翰斯·霍普金斯健康安全中心高级学者、助理教授克丽丝特尔·沃森(Crystal Watson, senior scholar and assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security)表示虽然当下焦点都放在了公共卫生应对上,不过病毒命名工作也值得优先处理。
"The naming of a new virus is often quite delayed and the focus until now has been on the public health response, which is understandable."
“给新病毒的命名通常都会滞后许多,而且到目前为止,焦点都放在公共卫生应对上,这是可以理解的。”
"But there are reasons the naming should be a priority."
“但是,病毒命名工作应该优先处理,是有原因的。”
她给出了几点原因:
❶ "The name it has now is not easy to use and the media and the public are using other names for the virus," says Dr Watson.
“目前的病毒名称用起来并不方便,而媒体和公众都在使用病毒的别名。”
❷ "The danger when you don't have an official name is that people start using terms like China Virus, and that can create a backlash against certain populations."
“没有正式名称的危险在于,人们开始使用诸如‘中国病毒’等表述,这会导致人们对部分特定人群产生强烈抵制。”
❸ With social media, unofficial names take hold quickly and are hard to take back, she says.
她说,非官方的名称很容易在社交媒体上迅速流行起来,这很难撤回。
其实,给病毒起名不慎,早已有前车之鉴。