新冠肺炎疫情凸显“美式人权”危机文章源自英文巴士-https://www.en84.com/9347.html
The COVID-19 Pandemic Magnifies the Crisis of “U.S.-Style Human Rights”文章源自英文巴士-https://www.en84.com/9347.html
文章源自英文巴士-https://www.en84.com/9347.html
中国人权研究会文章源自英文巴士-https://www.en84.com/9347.html
The China Society for Human Rights Studies (CSHRS)文章源自英文巴士-https://www.en84.com/9347.html
文章源自英文巴士-https://www.en84.com/9347.html
2020年6月文章源自英文巴士-https://www.en84.com/9347.html
June 2020文章源自英文巴士-https://www.en84.com/9347.html
文章源自英文巴士-https://www.en84.com/9347.html
突如其来的新冠肺炎疫情，是第二次世界大战结束以来人类经历的最严重的全球公共卫生突发事件，也是世界各国面临的一次“人权大考”。病毒没有国界，疫病不分种族。科学采取疫情防控措施、全力保障人民生命安全和身体健康，是各国政府共同承担的人权责任。然而，美国政府在应对疫情上的自利短见、任性低效和不负责任，不仅造成约200万美国民众感染病毒、11万多人死亡的悲剧，更使得美国长期存在的社会撕裂、贫富分化、种族歧视、弱势群体权益保障不力等问题充分暴露和持续恶化，导致美国民众陷入深重的人权灾难。文章源自英文巴士-https://www.en84.com/9347.html
The sudden and unexpected outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic is the most serious global public health emergency that humanity has experienced since the end of World War II. It is also a “big test of human rights conditions” for all countries across the globe. The virus does not respect borders, nor is race or nationality relevant in the face of the disease. Given this, to honor our common commitment to human rights, governments of different countries are obliged to adopt scientific measures for the prevention and control of the virus and do their best to ensure the health and safety of their people. Nevertheless, the U.S. government’s self-interested, short-sighted, inefficient, and irresponsible response to the pandemic has not only caused the tragedy in which about 2 million Americans became infected with the virus and more than 110,000 have died from it, but also caused the exposure and deterioration of the long-existing problems within the United States, such as a divisive society, the polarization between the rich and the poor, racial discrimination, and the inadequate protection of the rights and interests of vulnerable groups. This has led the American people into grave human rights disasters.
一、美国政府应对疫情不力导致人权灾难
1. The U.S. Government’s Ineffective Response to the Pandemic Leading to Human Rights Disasters
美国联邦政府对待疫情防控心有旁骛、懈怠失措、自以为是，迟至2020年3月13日才宣布美国因疫情进入紧急状态，付出了数万人的生命代价。美国约翰斯·霍普金斯大学发布的疫情统计数据显示，截至美国东部时间6月9日，美国累计新冠肺炎感染确诊病例达1971302例，累计死亡病例达111620例，两项数据均大幅高于其他国家或地区。这对于全球经济和科技实力最强、医疗资源最丰富的美国而言，无疑是一个令人悲伤的讽刺。
Being distracted, slack, and opinionated in the face of the pandemic, the United States Federal Government declared a national emergency on March 13, after tens of thousands of deaths had occurred. The pandemic statistics released by Johns Hopkins University in the United States showed that as of June 9 Eastern Standard Time (EST), there had been 1,971,302 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 111,620 deaths from the virus in the United States, with both figures significantly higher than those of other countries. For the United States, which boasts the strongest economic and technological strength and the most abundant medical resources in the world, this is a sad irony.
忽视疫情预警。根据《纽约时报》《华盛顿邮报》等媒体2020年4月复盘的美国疫情时间线，美国政府一再忽视疫情警告，怠于采取防控措施。美国白宫国家安全委员会在1月初就收到情报，预测病毒将在美国蔓延。白宫贸易与制造业政策办公室主任彼得·纳瓦罗在1月29日撰写的一份备忘录中，详细列举了疫情暴发的潜在风险：可能会有多达50万人死亡，并造成数万亿美元的经济损失。美国卫生与公众服务部部长亚历克斯·阿扎等卫生官员和医学专家也多次警告疫情在美国暴发的危险。但美国政府不仅对各种警告置之不理，反而着重于控制信息传播，限制医学专家向公众发布疫情信息，甚至发布虚假信息误导民众，称新冠病毒是“大号流感”，感染病毒的风险和死亡率“非常低”，疫情会很快“奇迹般地消失”，导致防控疫情的“黄金窗口期”被白白浪费。更有甚者，包括时任美国国会参议院情报委员会主席的理查德·伯尔在内的多名国会议员，还涉嫌内幕交易丑闻——他们利用职务之便较早了解疫情严峻形势，却一边对公众淡化疫情风险，一边在疫情引发股市大跌之前抛售大量股票，上演“完美”避险。
Ignoring the Pandemic Warnings. According to the revisited timeline of the pandemic in the United States, which was released by The New York Times and Washington Post in April 2020, the U.S. government had repeatedly ignored the pandemic warnings and slacked off on pandemic control. In early January, the National Security Council (NSC) received intelligence reports predicting the spread of the virus in the United States. On January 29, Peter Navarro, Director of the Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy at the White House, laid out in striking detail the potential risks of a coronavirus pandemic: as many as half a million deaths and trillions of dollars in economic losses. U.S. health officials and medical experts, such as Secretary of the United States Department of Health and Human Services Alex Azar, also repeatedly warned of the deadly pandemic in the United States. Unfortunately, the U.S. government ignored these warnings. Instead, it focused on controlling the spreading of information, restricted medical experts’ freedom to release information on the pandemic to the public, and even published false information to mislead the public, such as calling the virus “a flu”, claiming that the virus has low infection and fatality rates, and saying that “One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.” Under such circumstances, the “golden window” period for infectious disease prevention and control was wasted. Even then, many members of the U.S. Senate, including Richard Burr, who was the chairman of the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee, were involved in insider trading scandals. They used their positions to understand the serious situation of the pandemic earlier, but they downplayed the risk of the pandemic in front of the public while selling a large number of stocks before the pandemic triggered a stock market crash. In this way, they had a “perfect hedge”.
优先考虑资本利益。《纽约时报》网站2020年4月13日报道，白宫新冠病毒应对工作组与国家安全委员会在2月14日就合作准备了一份题为《美国政府应对2019年新型冠状病毒的措施》的备忘录，其中明确建议采取包括“大幅限制公众集会规模，取消几乎所有体育赛事和表演，取消不能通过电话召开的公众和私人会议，考虑学校停课”等严格的疫情管制措施。然而决策层在听取相关措施将导致美国股市崩盘的判断后，立刻否决了该备忘录。可见美国政府在抗疫决策上在资本利益和人民利益之间进行了价值排序，并未把民众的生命权和健康权放在第一位，反而优先考虑资本市场的反应，导致政府既未对民众进行有效示警，也没有为疫情大流行所带来的潜在医疗资源消耗做准备，把美国民众推向感染和死亡的边缘。
Prioritizing Capital Interests. The website of The New York Times reported on April 13, 2020, that the White House COVID-19 Response Working Group and the NSC jointly prepared a memo dated February 14, which was titled “U.S. Government Response to the 2019 Novel Coronavirus.” According to the report, the memo documented drastic pandemic-control measures including: “significantly limiting public gatherings and cancellation of almost all sporting events, performances, and public and private meetings that cannot be convened by phone. Consider school closures.” Nevertheless, the decision-makers immediately rejected the memo after hearing that the measures would lead to the collapse of the U.S. stock market. This showed how the U.S. government prioritized capital interests and the response of the capital market, rather than making the people’s right to life and health a priority. Due to this, the U.S. government failed to give effective warnings to the public and failed to get prepared for the potential consumption of medical resources caused by the pandemic, bringing the American people to the brink of infection and death.
将抗疫问题政治化。疫情在美国暴发后，一些美国政客并不把保障人民的生命和健康作为首要任务，反而将疫情作为攻击政治对手的武器，谋求选举利益。权威医学杂志《柳叶刀》网站5月16日罕见地发表社论，直指美国的公共卫生领域受到政党政治的干预，美国疾病预防与控制中心的作用被一再削弱，美国政府不积极采取检测、追踪和隔离等基本医疗防疫措施，反而寄希望于“神奇的子弹”——包括疫苗、新药，甚至盼望病毒最终会“神奇消失”。美国著名政治学者弗朗西斯·福山5月4日在《国家利益》网站发表《美国政治腐朽的代价》一文，指出政党政治的高度极化使得政治制衡制度成为决策不可逾越的障碍；疫情大流行原本应该成为抛开分歧、展现团结的机会，却进一步加深了政治极化。政客将疫情视为攫取权力和党派利益的契机，而这却是以不计其数的美国普通民众的生命为代价的。
Politicizing the Anti-pandemic Endeavor. When the virus broke out in the United States, some U.S. politicians used it as a weapon to attack political opponents and seek election benefits instead of regarding the drive to protect the lives and health of their people as their top priority. The website of The Lancet, an authoritative medical journal, published an editorial on May 16, which was a rare case for the journal. The editorial explicitly pointed out the intervention of political parties in the public health sector of the United States, and the weakening role of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It criticized the U.S. government for not actively adopting basic medical and anti-pandemic measures such as detection, tracking, and isolation, placing its hopes on “magic bullets” such as vaccines and new drugs, and hoping that the virus would eventually “magically disappear”. On May 4, the famous U.S. political scientist Francis Fukuyama published the article The Wages of American Political Decay on the website The National Interest, pointing out that the highly polarized party politics made the political checks and balances an insurmountable obstacle to decision-making; that the pandemic, which should have been an opportunity to put aside differences and show unity, further deepened the political polarization. Politicians viewed the pandemic as an opportunity to seize power and partisan interests, and this came at the cost of the lives of countless American people.
导致灾难性后果。《纽约时报》网站2020年5月20日报道，美国哥伦比亚大学的研究显示，美国行动限制措施的延迟导致至少3.6万人付出生命：如果美国政府提前一星期实施行动限制措施，能够多挽救3.6万人的生命；而如果美国政府提前两星期就开始实施行动限制措施，美国83%死于新冠病毒的患者将幸免于难。《纽约时报》甚至在5月24日史无前例地用整个头版列出1000名新冠肺炎死者的姓名、年龄和身份，并在导语中写道：“这里列出的1000人仅占死者总数的1%。他们不仅是一个个名字，他们曾是我们当中的一员。”《时代》周刊网站5月20日报道，美国延迟采取社交疏离政策导致了90%的新冠死亡病例，付出如此多生命代价本质上是美国民主的失败。
Leading to Catastrophic Consequences. The website of The New York Times reported on May 20, 2020, that research by Columbia University of the United States showed that delays in adopting movement restrictions had caused at least 36,000 people to die. According to the research, if the U.S. government had adopted movement restrictions one week earlier, it could have saved 36,000 lives, and if the U.S. government had adopted movement restrictions two weeks earlier, 83 percent of the deaths from COVID-19 could have been avoided. On May 24, The New York Times unprecedentedly dedicated its entire front page to 1,000 U.S. COVID-19 victims. Their names, ages, and brief descriptions were listed under the headline “U.S. Deaths Near 100,000, an Incalculable Loss,” with a sub headline reading: “They Were Not Simply Names on a List. They Were Us.” The website of the Time reported on May 20 that the delayed social-distancing measures caused 90 percent of the deaths from COVID-19 in the United States, and observed that such a huge loss of life was essentially a failure of U.S. democracy.
二、美国社会的不平等在疫情中暴露无遗
2. Inequality within U.S. Society Being Fully Exposed during the Pandemic
在美国，无论自由派学者还是保守派学者，都赞同一个基本事实——美国社会存在严重的不平等。造成不平等的深层次制度原因在于，美国政府和政党长期被利益集团操纵和俘获，无法制定和实施促进社会公平的税收、产业和社保政策。面对此次疫情，美国社会在阶层和经济方面的不平等进一步暴露和加剧。
In the United States, both liberal and conservative scholars agree on one basic fact that there is stark inequality within U.S. society. The deep-seated institutional reason for such inequality is that the U.S. government and political parties have long been manipulated by interest groups, and are unable to formulate and implement tax, industrial, and social security policies that promote social equality. During the pandemic, the social and economic inequality within U.S. society has been exposed and exacerbated.
权贵阶层获得病毒检测特殊待遇。病毒感染不分贫富，但有限的检测和医疗资源却在美国无法得到公平配置。《纽约时报》网站2020年3月19日报道，美国众多权贵在各州检测设备短缺且自身无感染症状的情况下，难以言明地进行了病毒检测。急救医生乌切·布莱克斯托克颇感无奈地直言：“（医生）不得不给病人的新冠病毒检测定额，且必须等5到7天才能得到结果；而名人却可以轻松测试，并迅速拿到结果”。这种明显的不公平现象令民众愈发质疑：在医护人员和许多病人都无法得到诊断时，权贵阶层凭借特权获得优先检测是否意味着剥夺了普通人的检测机会。英国《卫报》网站3月21日刊文指出，“泰坦尼克号撞击冰山沉没的时候，妇女和儿童首先被保护和救助；但是在新冠病毒面前，美国却是富人和权势群体优先获救”。美国在新冠病毒检测上的“贫富差距”，凸显了其疫情防控系统的延误、混乱与不公正。
The Elite Class of the United States Being Specially Treated in Coronavirus Testing. Viral infection does not distinguish between rich and poor, but the limited testing and medical resources were not fairly allocated in the United States. The website of The New York Times reported on March 19, 2020, that many dignitaries in the United States somehow underwent virus testing when they had no signs of infection and when nearly every state in the country lacked testing equipment. Uche Blackstock, an emergency medicine physician, said frustratedly, “As a physician, I find it upsetting that celebrities and government officials without symptoms have been able to access testing quickly with same-day results, while I’ve had to ration out testing to my patients with turnaround times of five or seven days.” This obvious injustice has made the public increasingly raise questions. When medical staff and many patients cannot be diagnosed, whether the privileged class obtains priority testing means that the ordinary people are deprived of testing opportunities. The website of The Guardian, a British newspaper, published an article on March 21 and commented that when the Titanic hit the iceberg and sank, women and children were protected and rescued first, but in the face of COVID-19, the United States has first rescued the rich and powerful groups. The gap between rich and poor in getting the virus tests in the United States has exposed the slackness, confusion, and injustice in its pandemic prevention and control system.
底层民众面临更加危险的处境。疫情使美国底层民众的生存状况越来越艰难，进一步加深了社会贫富分化。根据哥伦比亚广播公司2019年的报道，近40%的美国人无法支付400美元的意外开支，有25%的美国人因为负担不起医疗费用而不得不放弃必要的治疗。美国《大西洋月刊》网站2020年4月报道，美国低收入人群患病后，“通常会延迟去看医生，不是因为他们不想康复，而是因为根本没有钱”。面对新冠肺炎疫情，美国有数千万人没有医疗保险，而新冠肺炎重症监护费用却高达数万美元。“生存还是毁灭”，并不只是文学作品中的生命哲学，也是美国底层民众面临的现实抉择。今日俄罗斯电视台4月30日报道，盖洛普公司的一项调查显示，七分之一的美国成年人表示，如果他们自己或家庭成员出现新冠肺炎相关症状，将因为担心负担不起治疗费用放弃治疗。联合国极端贫困与人权问题特别报告员菲利普·奥尔斯顿4月16日指出，美国穷人正受到新冠病毒的“最严重打击”，“由于长期的忽视和歧视，低收入和贫困人口面临着更高的受到冠状病毒侵害的风险，而一个混乱的、注重企业的联邦应对措施未能完全照顾到他们的利益”。
People at the Bottom of U.S. Society Facing an Increasingly Dangerous Situation. The pandemic has made the lives of people at the bottom of U.S. society increasingly difficult, and further intensified the social polarization between rich and poor. According to a CBS report in 2019, nearly 40 percent of Americans would struggle to cover a $400 emergency expense, and 25 percent of Americans skipped necessary medical care because they could not afford the cost. The website of The Atlantic reported in April 2020 that low-income people in the United States would usually delay seeing a doctor when they became ill, not because they did not want to recover, but because they had no money at all. Faced with the COVID-19 pandemic, tens of millions of people in the United States are not covered by medical insurance, when intensive care for COVID-19 costs as high as tens of thousands of dollars in the country. “To be or not to be” is not just a philosophical proposition of some literary work, but a realistic choice that the people at the bottom of U.S. society have to make. Russia Today reported on April 30 that a Gallup survey revealed that one in seven American adults said that if they or their family members developed symptoms related to COVID-19, they would probably give up medical treatment because they were worried that they could not afford the costs. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Philip Alston, pointed out on April 16 that the poor in the United States were “being hit hardest by the COVID-19 pandemic”. He observed, “Low-income and poor people face far higher risks from the coronavirus due to chronic neglect and discrimination, and a muddled, corporate-driven federal response has failed them.”
高失业率使工薪阶层陷入生存危机。根据美国劳工部2020年5月28日公布的数据，美国3月15日至5月23日累计首次申请失业救济人数达4080万。面对疫情带来的高失业率，由于长期贫富分化和结构性歧视，美国工薪阶层抵御风险的能力大大减弱。沃克斯新闻网4月10日报道指出，“从餐饮业、旅游业到媒体业，整个美国经济都感受到了（疫情的）影响。但是就像危机带来的其他影响一样，那些本已是最脆弱的群体也将首当其冲地受到经济影响”。“这段时间最容易遭受裁员的人正是那些薪水最低的人，例如餐饮业和零售业的低薪工人”。根据美国全国餐馆业协会4月20日发布的调查报告，受疫情影响，三分之二的餐厅工人（约800万人）因餐厅关闭已被解雇或休假。虽然美国政府也推出了旨在援助中小企业的“薪资保护计划”，但一些资金较充裕的大企业却利用规则漏洞趁机获得巨额贷款，而一些亟需贷款“续命”的小企业、小商铺却无法得到救助。上述调查报告显示，至少有60%的经营者表示，现有的联邦政府救济计划不会令他们减少裁员。可见，美国工薪阶层最早体验到疫情带来的经济衰退的痛感，成为美国政府低效抗疫举措的牺牲品。
High Unemployment Rates Leading the Working Class into a Crisis of Survival. According to data released by the U.S. Department of Labor on May 28, 2020, the cumulative number of Americans applying for unemployment relief from March 15 to May 23 has for the first time reached 40.8 million. Given the high unemployment rate brought about by the pandemic and the long-existing structural discrimination and polarization between rich and poor, the U.S. working class’s ability to resist risks has greatly diminished. Vox News reported on April 10 that from the catering industry and tourism to the media industry, the entire U.S. economy has felt the impact of the pandemic, and just like the impact of other crises, the most vulnerable groups bore the brunt of the economic impact. According to the report, during the pandemic, the people who are most vulnerable amid layoffs are those who earn the lowest salaries, such as low-wage workers in the catering and retail industries. According to the report released by the National Restaurant Association on April 20, two-thirds of restaurant workers (about 8 million people) have been dismissed or put on vacation due to the pandemic. When the U.S. government launched the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), which was intended to help small- and medium-sized enterprises, some large companies with sufficient funds took advantage of the rule loopholes to acquire huge loans, but small businesses and small shops that urgently needed loans to sustain themselves could not get the help. The above-mentioned report also showed that at least 60 percent of employers said that the existing relief plan of the federal government could not help them reduce layoffs. All this has revealed that the U.S. working class was the first to feel the pain of the economic recession brought about by the pandemic, and became the victims of the U.S. government’s inefficient anti-pandemic measures.
三、美国的种族歧视在疫情中愈演愈烈
3. Racial Discrimination Being Intensified within the United States during the Pandemic
系统性种族歧视是美国社会的痼疾。2016年以来，美国白人至上主义回潮，种族歧视呈愈演愈烈之势。新冠肺炎疫情带来的社会紧张情绪，特别是有限抗疫资源配置的不均等，进一步加深了美国“主流社会”对亚裔、非洲裔和拉美裔等少数种族的歧视。
The systemic racial discrimination is a chronic illness of U.S. society. Since 2016, white supremacy has revived and racial discrimination has intensified in the United States. Social tensions brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic, especially the unequal allocation of limited anti-pandemic resources, have further deepened mainstream society’s discrimination against minorities, such as Asian, African, and Hispanic Americans.
亚裔群体遭受严重的污名化攻击。英国《卫报》网站2020年4月1日报道指出，“（美国社会）对亚洲人的刻板印象从未消除”，一些美国媒体在报道新冠肺炎病例时都附有亚洲人面孔的照片。《纽约时报》网站4月16日报道指出，“新冠病毒肆虐期间，在美国身为亚裔是一种非常孤独的感觉”。疫情暴发以来，亚裔美国人在公共场合遭受羞辱甚至攻击的事件比比皆是。一些美国政客对此更是有意误导。在世界卫生组织将新冠病毒正式命名为“COVID－19”后，包括国务卿蓬佩奥在内的美国政府高层仍然坚持使用“中国病毒”“武汉病毒”的说法，甚至遭致国际社会强烈批评后也拒不改口。联合国当代形式种族主义问题特别报告员滕达伊·阿丘梅3月23日和4月21日先后指出，有关国家政客主动发表公开或暗示性的仇外言论，使用别有用心的名称来替代新冠病毒，这种把特定疾病与某个具体国家或民族相联系的仇外表达不负责任、令人不安。“这一波‘疫情歧视’将原本较为隐蔽的种族偏见彻底揭示出来，在全球大流行的背景下暴露得越发明显”。在自诩为“自由灯塔”的美国，政府官员公然煽动、引导和纵容种族歧视，无异于对现代人权观念的悍然羞辱。
Asian Americans Suffering from Stigmatization. The website of The Guardian, a British newspaper, pointed out on April 1, 2020 that stereotyping of Asian Americans still happens in the United States, and when reporting on the COVID-19 situation, some U.S. media always attach photos of Asian faces. The website of The New York Times observed on April 16 that the COVID-19 pandemic meant isolation for Asian Americans. Since the outbreak of the virus, Asian Americans have often been humiliated and even attacked in public places. Some U.S. politicians even deliberately misled the public. After the World Health Organization officially named the new coronavirus “COVID-19”, senior U.S. leaders, including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, still insisted on referring to the virus as the “Chinese virus” or “Wuhan virus”. They also refused to correct that mistake even after being strongly criticized by the international community. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, Tendayi Achiume, pointed out on March 23 and April 21 that politicians of relevant countries proactively expressed xenophobic opinions or made xenophobic implications by deliberately replacing COVID-19 with other names that linked this particular disease to a particular country or nation, which was an irresponsible and disturbing expression. The current pandemic-related discrimination has fully exposed the once-concealed racial prejudice. In the United States, which bills itself as the “beacon of freedom”, government officials blatantly incite, guide, and condone racial discrimination, which is tantamount to humiliating the modern concept of human rights.
非洲裔和拉美裔在疫情中承受巨大的种族不平等。种族歧视深深植根于美国的历史与现实之中，而新冠肺炎疫情就像一面放大镜，将种族歧视带来的恶果以更加悲剧的形式呈现出来。非洲裔受到新冠肺炎疫情“不成比例”影响的状况极为普遍。密歇根州卫生与公共服务部2020年4月2日公布的该州新冠肺炎确诊和死亡病例种族构成数据显示，非洲裔仅占该州总人口的12%，却占确诊病例的33%，死亡病例占比更高达40%。美国疾病预防与控制中心公布的全国性统计数据显示，截至5月13日，美国新冠肺炎致死病例中非洲裔占22.4%，明显高于其在总人口中12.5%的份额。堪萨斯州、伊利诺伊州和密苏里州的非洲裔分别仅占总人口的5.7%、14.1%、11.6%，在死亡病例中占比却分别高达29.7%、30.3%和35.1%。拉美裔在疫情中也遭致更高的感染率和致死率。根据纽约市4月初公布的新冠肺炎死亡病例种族分布，拉美裔占34%。《纽约时报》网站4月14日报道指出，非洲裔和拉美裔的感染率和死亡率之所以居高不下，是因为“今天他们在健康上的差距，直接来自于历史上财富和机会的不平等”。英国《金融时报》网站5月15日报道指出，非洲裔和拉美裔美国人比白人更有可能从事维持社会运行所必需的工作，他们贫困率较高，更容易患糖尿病和高血压等“共病”，使得他们更易感染新冠病毒。“这场大流行病加剧了美国的种族差异”，“没有什么比这场大封锁中的生与死更能体现美国的肤色差异了”。5月25日，明尼苏达州非洲裔男子乔治·弗洛伊德遭白人警察暴力执法致死，引发美国全国范围的大规模抗议示威活动，再次凸显美国民众对于种族不平等日益恶化的不满与愤怒。
African and Hispanic Americans Falling Victims to Severe Racial Inequality. Racial discrimination is deeply rooted in the history and reality of the United States. The COVID-19 pandemic has put this issue underneath a magnifying glass and tragically exposed its negative consequences. African Americans across the country are infected with and die from COVID-19 at a disproportionately higher rate than any other group in the United States. The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) released a racial breakdown of the state’s confirmed COVID-19 cases and COVID-19 deaths on April 2, 2020, which showed that African Americans, who make up only 12 percent of Michigan’s population, accounted for 33 percent of Michigan’s confirmed COVID-19 cases and 40 percent of the state’s COVID-19 deaths. National statistics released by the CDC showed that as of May 13, African Americans accounted for 22.4 percent of deaths from COVID-19 in the United States. This percentage is significantly higher than the African Americans’ 12.5 percent share of the total U.S. population. African Americans in Kansas, Illinois, and Missouri accounted for only 5.7 percent, 14.1 percent, and 11.6 percent of the total population of the states, respectively, but accounted for 29.7 percent, 30.3 percent, and 35.1 percent of these states’ deaths from COVID-19. Hispanic Americans also have disproportionately higher infection and fatality rates during the pandemic. In early April, New York City released a racial breakdown of the city’s deaths from COVID-19. According to it, Hispanic Americans accounted for 34 percent of the city’s fatal cases of COVID-19. The website of The New York Times pointed out on April 14 that the fact the pandemic infected and killed African and Hispanic Americans at disproportionately higher rates was the result of a health gap directly created by the historical inequality of wealth and opportunities. The website of the Financial Times, a British newspaper, pointed out on May 15 that African Americans and Hispanic Americans were more likely than whites to perform the work that was necessary for the maintenance of social operations, making them more susceptible to poverty, diabetes, high blood pressure, and COVID-19. The report also pointed out that this pandemic exacerbated the racial differences in the United States, and that nothing could better display the difference in skin color in the United States than the life and death stories in the pandemic shutdown. On May 25, George Floyd, an African-American man from Minnesota, died after a white police officer pressed his knee on Floyd’s neck for several minutes during his arrest. This led to large-scale protests and demonstrations across the United States, once again exposing the dissatisfaction and anger that the American people have for the worsening racial inequality.
种族主义暴力事件频发多发。疫情期间，美国基于种族主义的暴力事件频发，亚裔群体遭受严重的人身攻击。仅2020年3月19日至4月1日，美国非盈利组织“停止仇恨亚裔”就收到超过1100起仇恨事件报告。2020年2月，洛杉矶一名16岁亚裔男孩在学校被诬称为“病毒携带者”遭到殴打。3月14日，在得克萨斯州米德兰市一家超市里，一名19岁男子故意用刀刺伤一名亚裔男子和其两名年幼的子女，理由是“他们是中国人并将新冠病毒传染给别人”。4月5日，纽约市布鲁克林区一名亚裔女性在家门口倒垃圾时，遭到种族主义分子泼洒不明化学液体攻击，导致其上半身、面部和手部严重烧伤。暴力事件进一步加剧了疫情期间紧张的社会气氛，社会分裂、种族对立和枪支泛滥随之恶化。4月15日，近200位美国外交政策学者、前外交官在《今日美国报》上发表声明指出，针对亚裔的仇恨犯罪和暴力袭击为美国敲响了警钟，美国各层级、各领域的领导人应采取行动，反对针对亚裔的种族主义行为，结束对亚裔社区的仇恨犯罪。
Frequent Racist Violence. During the pandemic, racist violence has haunted the United States, and Asian Americans suffer from venomous personal attacks. From March 19 to April 1, 2020, alone, the U.S. nonprofit organization “Stop AAPI Hate” received more than 1,100 reports of hate incidents. In February 2020, a 16-year-old Asian boy in Los Angeles was accused of being a “virus carrier” and viciously beaten at school. On March 14, in a supermarket in Midland, Texas, a 19-year-old man deliberately stabbed an Asian man and his two young children with a knife on the ground that “they were Chinese and were spreading the novel coronavirus to others.” On April 5, an Asian woman in Brooklyn, New York City, was attacked by a racist who spilled unidentified chemical liquid on her to severely burn her upper body, face, and hands when she was emptying rubbish at her door. Violent incidents have further exacerbated the social tension during the pandemic, and problems such as a divisive society, racial divide, and the proliferation of guns have worsened. On April 15, nearly 200 U.S. foreign policy scholars and former diplomats jointly issued a statement in USA Today, pointing out that hate crimes and violent attacks against Asian Americans sounded the alarm for the United States, and that leaders at all levels and in all sectors should take action to oppose racism against Asians and end hate crimes against Asian communities.
四、美国的弱势群体在疫情中生存维艰
4. Vulnerable Groups in the United States Struggling to Survive during the Pandemic
对于社会弱势和边缘群体的生存照顾，代表了一个社会的良心，也是验证一国真实人权状况的试金石。疫情期间，美国的“残酷资本主义”特征暴露无疑，致使老年人、无家可归者和儿童陷入悲惨境地。
The care for the survival of socially disadvantaged and marginalized groups represents the virtue of a society. It is also a touchstone for the human rights situation in a country. During the pandemic, the features of the United States’ cruel capitalism have been fully exposed, which have forced the elderly, homeless people, and children into a tragic situation.
老年人成为政府抗疫不力的“牺牲品”。联合国秘书长古特雷斯多次强调，老年人和年轻人享有同等的生命权和健康权，疫情之下谁也不能被牺牲、被抛弃。然而在疫情中原本就面临更大风险的美国老年人群体，因年龄歧视被进一步弱化和边缘化，生命权无法得到基本保障。2020年3月23日和4月22日，得克萨斯州副州长丹·帕特里克在接受福克斯新闻网采访时两次表示，他“宁愿死也不愿看到公共卫生措施损害美国经济”，同意以老年人的生命为代价“冒险重启美国经济”。美国右翼媒体《每日连线》新闻网主编本·夏皮罗4月29日在一个访谈节目中冷血地宣称，“81岁的人死于新冠肺炎和30岁的人死于新冠肺炎不是一个概念”；“如果一个81岁的老奶奶死在养老院，这虽然很悲惨，但美国人的预期寿命就是80岁”。《纽约时报》网站5月11日报道，美国养老院等老年人长期照护机构已有至少2.81万名入住者和工作人员死于新冠病毒感染，约占美国新冠死亡病例的三分之一。在这些护理机构中，许多老年人生活在较为封闭的环境中，感染新冠病毒后死亡风险很高。《大西洋月刊》网站3月28日和4月29日先后刊发《年龄歧视使疫情恶化》《我们正在杀死老年人》两篇文章，指出美国的老年人长期照护系统存在资金投入、人员配备不足等严重缺陷，在保障老年人权益方面“比其他国家应对较弱”，“这出于很多政治上的原因”。《华盛顿邮报》网站5月9日报道称，美国的抗疫行动“成了一场国家批准的屠杀”，“它故意牺牲老年人、工人、非洲裔和拉美裔人口”。
The Elderly, the “Victims” of the Government’s Ineffectiveness in Fighting the Pandemic. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has repeatedly stressed that the elderly, like young people, have the same rights to life and health amid the COVID-19 pandemic, and no person is expendable. Unfortunately, during the epidemic in the United States, the elderly group, which is naturally at greater risk, has been further weakened and marginalized due to age discrimination, and the elderly’s right to life has not been ensured. On March 23 and April 22, 2020, Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick expressed in interviews with Fox News that he would rather die than see public health measures damage the U.S. economy and take the risk of restarting the U.S. economy at the cost of elderly people’s lives. Ben Shapiro, the editor-in-chief of The Daily Wire, which is a right-wing U.S. media outlet, declared coldly on an interview show on April 29, “If somebody who is 81 dies of COVID-19, that is not the same thing as somebody who is 30 dying of COVID-19.” He also said, “If grandma dies in a nursing home at age 81, and that’s tragic and that’s terrible, also the life expectancy in the United States is 80.” The website of The New York Times reported on May 11 that at least 28,100 occupants and staff members of long-term care institutions such as nursing homes in the United States have died of COVID-19, accounting for about one-third of COVID-19 deaths in the United States. In these care institutions, many elderly people live in a relatively closed environment, so their risk of death from COVID-19 infection is very high. The website of The Atlantic published two articles respectively on March 28 and April 29, titled Ageism Is Making the Pandemic Worse and We’re Literally Killing Elders Now. They pointed out that long-existing defects in the old-age care system, such as insufficient capital investment and staffing, caused the United States to fall behind in ensuring the rights and interests of the elderly, and that such a situation was due to many political reasons. The website of the Washington Post observed on May 9 that the U.S. anti-pandemic action had become a state-approved massacre that deliberately sacrificed the lives of the elderly, the working class, African Americans, and Hispanic Americans.
无家可归者在疫情中无处安放。《今日美国报》网站2020年4月22日报道，美国每晚都有55万多人无家可归；据无家可归者联盟统计，每1万名美国人中约有17人经历过无家可归，其中约33%是有孩子的家庭。无家可归者中有很多年迈的老人和残障人士，他们原本身体健康状况就不佳，生活和卫生条件恶劣，是病毒的易感群体。疫情期间，流落街头的无家可归者遭到严厉驱逐，被迫住进临时收容所隔离。路透社网站4月23日报道，美国各地的无家可归收容所因人员拥挤而难以保持社交距离，使得病毒极易传播。截至4月20日，纽约市收容所中已有43人因感染新冠病毒死亡，有617人病毒检测呈阳性。《纽约时报》网站4月13日报道称，无家可归者收容所成为纽约市疫情的“定时炸弹”，超过1.7万人住在为单身成年人准备的集中收容所中，睡在床上几乎可以手碰手。《自然》杂志网站5月7日报道，研究人员开始对美国无家可归者进行病毒检测时发现，那里的情况已经失控。《波士顿环球报》网站5月4日报道，波士顿市已有596名无家可归者确诊感染新冠病毒，占当地该群体已接受检测人口的三分之一。《洛杉矶时报》网站5月14日报道，研究显示美国的无家可归者数量受疫情影响可能一年内激增高达45%，导致公共卫生危机进一步加剧。
The Homeless Having Nowhere to Go during the Pandemic. The website of USA Today reported on April 22, 2020, that more than 550,000 people were homeless every night in the United States. The report also pointed out that according to the statistics released by the Homeless Alliance, about 17 out of every 10,000 Americans have experienced homelessness and about 33 percent of them are families with children. Many of the homeless Americans are elderly people and disabled people. Given their originally poor physical health and bad living and hygienic conditions, they are susceptible to the virus. During the epidemic, the homeless who are living on the streets are deported and forced to live in temporary shelters for isolation. The website of Reuters reported on April 23 that the crowded shelters made it impossible for the homeless who lived there to maintain social distance, which made it easier for the virus to spread. As of April 20, 43 homeless people living in New York City’s shelters had died from infection of COVID-19, and 617 tested positive for COVID-19. The website of The New York Times reported on April 13 that the shelters for the homeless had become a delayed-action bomb of a virus outbreak in New York City, where more than 17,000 people lived and slept almost side by side in centralized shelters. The website of Nature journal reported on May 7 that when researchers began conducting virus testing on homeless people in the United States, they found that the situation there had gotten out of control. The website of the Boston Globe reported on May 4 that 596 homeless people in Boston had been diagnosed with COVID-19, accounting for one-third of the confirmed cases in the region. The website of the Los Angeles Times reported on May 14 that research showed that due to the impact of the pandemic, the number of homeless people in the United States might surge by as much as 45 percent within a year, further exacerbating the public health crisis.
贫困儿童和移民儿童状况堪忧。美国至今未批准联合国《儿童权利公约》这一核心国际人权公约。近年来，美国的儿童贫困和受虐待问题一直非常严重，疫情暴发使之进一步加剧。福布斯新闻网2020年5月7日报道，调查显示，大量美国儿童在疫情中面临饥饿问题。截至4月底，五分之一以上的美国家庭面临食品危机；在拥有12岁以下儿童的美国家庭中，面临食品危机的比例高达五分之二。福布斯新闻网5月9日报道，疫情期间美国有关儿童剥削的报告数量激增，全国失踪和受虐儿童中心4月份收到420万份相关报告，比2020年3月增长200万份，比2019年4月增长近300万份。更令人担忧的是，美国还关押着大量无人陪伴的移民儿童，在病毒大流行中处于极端危险境地。联合国移民人权问题特别报告员莫拉莱斯等多位联合国人权专家4月27日发表联合声明，要求美国政府将移民从人满为患且卫生条件恶劣的拘留中心转移；5月29日，联合国人权理事会15名特别机制专家发表联合声明，敦促美国采取更多措施，防止疫情在拘留中心暴发。联合国网站5月21日报道，自3月以来，美国政府不顾疫情风险，将至少1000名无人陪伴的移民儿童遣送回中南美洲，联合国儿童基金会批评此举将导致儿童处于更大的危险之中。
Worrisome Situation of Poor Children and Immigrant Children. The United States has not yet ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which is one of the core international human rights conventions. In recent years, child poverty and abuse has remained a grave problem in the United States. This problem has been exacerbated by the pandemic. Forbes News reported on May 7, 2020 that a survey showed a large number of American children were facing hunger during the pandemic. As of the end of April, more than one-fifth of American households had been facing food crises, and two-fifths of American households with children under 12 years of age have been facing such crises. Forbes News reported on May 9 that the number of child exploitation reports in the United States surged during the pandemic. The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children received 4.2 million reports in April, an increase of 2 million from March 2020 and an increase of nearly 3 million from April 2019. Apart from that, a more worrisome fact is that a large number of unaccompanied immigrant children are still being held in detention centers in the United States. They are currently in an extremely dangerous situation during the pandemic. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on human rights of migrants Felipe Gonzalez Morales and other UN human rights experts issued a joint statement on April 27, requesting the U.S. government to transfer immigrants from overcrowded and insanitary detention centers. On May 29, 15 experts of the Special Procedures of United Nations Human Rights Council issued a joint statement urging the United States to take more measures to prevent virus outbreaks in the detention centers. The website of the United Nations reported on May 21 that since March, the U.S. government had repatriated at least 1,000 unaccompanied immigrant children to Central and South America regardless of the risk of the pandemic. The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) criticized this move, for it would expose the children to greater danger.
五、美国政府相关行为严重背离国际人权法精神
5. Relevant Behaviors of the U.S. Government Seriously Violating the Spirit of International Human Rights Law
面对美国国内疫情蔓延对公民生命权和健康权的巨大威胁，美国政府非但未将精力投入疫情防控，反而挥舞霸权大棒四处煽风点火，试图转移视线、推卸责任，对国际社会团结合作应对疫情造成严重破坏。
When the citizens’ right to life and health is severely threatened by the spreading pandemic, the U.S. government, instead of focusing on controlling the pandemic, wields a hegemonic stick and fans the flames of trouble everywhere, trying to divert attention and shirk responsibility. Its behaviors have seriously undermined the international community’s concerted efforts to control the pandemic.
抗疫不力违反保障生命权的国家义务。《公民权利和政治权利国际公约》规定，人人享有生命权，国家有义务采取积极措施保障生命权。作为此公约的缔约国，美国政府面对新冠肺炎疫情未将人民的生命权和健康权置于首位，反而将国内政党竞选和国际上打压中国的政治需要置于人民生命安全之上，错失遏制病毒传播的最佳时机，造成约200万人感染、11万多人死亡的重大人权灾难。美国政府显然未能履行其应尽的保护人民生命免受流行疾病威胁的国家义务。英国《独立报》网站2020年4月10日评论称，美国总是把人权挂在嘴边，却忽视自己的人权义务，对人民生命公然漠视。《赫芬顿邮报》网站5月6日报道，耶鲁大学流行病学家格雷格·贡萨尔维斯对美国政府应对新冠肺炎疫情的拙劣表现进行严格评估后，毫不留情地指出这“非常接近于默许的大屠杀”。
Ineffective Anti-pandemic Efforts Failing the National Duty of Ensuring the Citizens’ Right to Life. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) stipulates that every human being has the inherent right to life, and countries are obliged to take proactive measures to guarantee their citizens’ right to life. As a party to the convention, the U.S. government, however, has not given priority to its citizens’ right to life and health during the pandemic. Instead, it has been prioritizing the political campaign at home and the political drive to suppress China abroad, rather than safeguarding the lives and safety of its citizens. Given this, it has missed the best chance to curb the spread of the virus, and caused a grave human rights disaster in which about 2 million people have been infected with COVID-19, and more than 110,000 have died from the virus. Clearly, the U.S. government has failed to fulfill its due national obligations to protect its people’s lives from the threat of epidemics. The website of The Independent, a British newspaper, commented on April 10, 2020, that the United States, an active advocator for human rights, ignored its own human rights obligations and blatantly overlooked its citizens’ lives. The website of the Huffington Post reported on May 6 that after making a rigorous assessment of the U.S. government’s poor performance during the COVID-19 pandemic, Yale University epidemiologist Gregg Gonsalves directly pointed out that this was getting awfully close to genocide by default.
恶意“污名化”中国违反平等与不歧视原则。平等与不歧视原则是国际人权法的核心准则，经《世界人权宣言》等一系列国际人权文书所确认。疫情暴发以来，美国政府高层不顾人类良知和伦理底线，为维护自身霸权借疫情大搞政治操弄，持续“污名化”中国，“武汉病毒”“中国病毒”等称呼在美国政客口中层出不穷。在科学界普遍认为病毒来自自然界的情况下，美国国务卿蓬佩奥甚至不惜以所谓虚假“情报”为幌子，一再声称病毒来自中国武汉的实验室。美国政客的行为明显违反世界卫生组织、世界动物卫生组织和联合国粮农组织2015年联合发布的《病毒命名最佳实践原则》，与世界卫生组织关于新冠肺炎的正式名称建议相悖。联合国当代形式种族主义问题特别报告员滕达伊·阿丘梅2020年3月23日指出，美国政府官员故意不使用国际认可的病毒名称，而是选择别有用心的名称来称呼新冠病毒，这种不负责任的、歧视性的国家言论植根于并会助长种族主义和仇外情绪，导致特定人群被污名化、排斥和暴力侵害，与国际人权法义务不符，是不可原谅的。
Maliciously Stigmatizing China in Violation of the Principles of Equality and Non-discrimination. The principles of equality and non-discrimination are the core norms of international human rights laws and are confirmed by a series of international human rights instruments, such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Since the outbreak of the virus, high-ranking U.S. government officials have violently disregarded human conscience and ethical bottom lines. To maintain the U.S. hegemony, these officials have politicized the pandemic and constantly stigmatized China by referring to the virus as the “Wuhan Virus” or the “China virus”. When the scientific community came to the conclusion that the exact source of the virus was from nature, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo still repeatedly claimed that the virus came from some lab in Wuhan according to some “intelligence reports” he read. These politicians’ behaviors have clearly violated World Health Organization Best Practices for the Naming of New Human Infectious Diseases, which was jointly issued by the World Health Organization, the World Organization for Animal Health, and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in 2015. The way they refer to the virus goes against the World Health Organization’s suggestion for the official name of the novel coronavirus disease. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, Tendayi Achiume, pointed out on March 23 that some U.S. government officials refused to use the internationally-recognized name of the virus and deliberately replaced it with other names that linked this particular disease to a particular country or nation, which was an irresponsible and disturbing expression that came from and would give rise to racism, xenophobia, stigmatization, and exclusion of certain groups, and violence against certain groups. She held that such behaviors were unforgivable and incompatible with the obligations stipulated by the international human rights laws.
停缴世卫组织会费阻碍全球共同抗疫。美国政府为推卸自身抗疫不力的责任，试图将世界卫生组织打造成“替罪羊”，一边挖空心思罗织各种不实指责，一边以停止缴纳会费相威胁。2020年4月14日，美国政府宣布暂停向世卫组织缴纳会费，遭到国际社会一致批评。联合国秘书长古特雷斯4月14日发表声明称，全球正在抗击新冠疫情，削减世卫组织或任何其他人道主义组织行动所需资源不合时宜。美国医学会主席帕特里斯·哈里斯4月15日发表声明说，抗击疫情需要国际合作，美国在这一关键时刻暂停向世卫组织提供资金支持，是在错误方向迈出的危险一步。欧盟外交与安全政策高级代表博雷利4月15日表示，“在现在这个时候，没有任何理由可以为这个行为进行辩护”。英国《卫报》网站4月15日发表评论称，在世界迫切需要共同战胜这场全球从未经历过的威胁时，美国政府停缴世卫组织会费是一种缺乏道德和破坏国际秩序的行为，是“对全球团结的骇人背叛”。德国外交部长马斯4月16日表示，世卫组织是全球抗击疫情的支柱，美国此时停缴世卫组织会费是“把飞行员扔出飞机”的不负责任行为。而美国国务卿蓬佩奥却在4月22日再次对世卫组织发起攻击，威胁永久停缴会费。5月29日，美国总统宣布终止与世卫组织关系。
Suspending the Payment of WHO Membership Fees Impeding the Joint Anti-Pandemic Efforts of the International Community. In order to shirk its responsibility for its disastrous anti-pandemic measures, the U.S. government tried to scapegoat the World Health Organization by fabricating false charges against the organization and threatening to stop paying its membership fees. On April 14, 2020, the U.S. government announced its suspension of paying dues to the WHO, which was unanimously criticized by the international community. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres issued a statement on April 14 stating that when the world was fighting the COVID-19 pandemic, it was inappropriate to reduce the resources required by the WHO or any other humanitarian organization for operations. The President of the American Medical Association, Patrice Harris, issued a statement on April 15 stating that combating the pandemic required international cooperation and that the suspension of financial support to the WHO at this critical moment is a dangerous step in the wrong direction. Josep Borrell, the European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, expressed on April 15 that at this time, there was no reason to justify such an action. On April 15, the website of The Guardian, a British newspaper, published an editorial and commented that when the world desperately needed to jointly overcome this threat that the world had never experienced before, the suspension of the WHO dues by the U.S. government was an act that lacked morality and disrupted the international order, and was a horrible betrayal to global solidarity. German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said on April 16 that the WHO was the mainstay of the global fight against the pandemic, and the suspension of the WHO dues by the United States at this time “would be nothing other than throwing the pilot out of the plane in mid-flight”. Under such circumstances, the U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo once again attacked the WHO on April 22, threatening to permanently suspend the payment of dues. On May 29, the president of the United States announced the suspension of relations with the WHO.
单边制裁违反人道精神和国际合作原则。国际合作是维持国际社会生存和运作的基石，是在全球层面确保人权和基本自由得以落实的重要原则，也是《联合国宪章》等国际文书确认的各国义务。在疫情全球蔓延、关乎人类生命与健康福祉的重要时刻，各国应当团结协作以应对疫情，维护全球公共卫生安全。美国政府在疫情期间依然对伊朗、古巴、委内瑞拉等国实施制裁，导致被制裁国家难以及时获得抗疫需要的医疗物资，严重威胁民众生命权和健康权。联合国人权事务高级专员米歇尔·巴切莱特2020年3月24日表示，在病毒全球大流行的情形下，制裁会阻碍医疗工作，给所有人增加风险；无论是出于维护全球公共卫生安全，还是为了维护被制裁国家数百万人的权利和生活，都应放松或暂停特殊领域的制裁。联合国极端贫困与人权问题特别报告员、安全饮用水和卫生问题特别报告员、教育权问题特别报告员5月6日发表联合声明，表示美国对委内瑞拉的制裁正对该国民众的人权产生严重影响，敦促美国在疫情肆虐情形下立即解除加剧该国民众苦难的制裁。
Unilateral Sanctions Violating the Spirit of Humanitarianism and the Principle of International Cooperation. International cooperation is the cornerstone of the existence and operation of the international community. It is an important principle for ensuring the implementation of human rights and fundamental freedoms across the globe. It is also a national obligation stipulated by international instruments, such as the Charter of the United Nations. At this critical moment when the deadly pandemic spreads globally and threatens human life, health, and well-being, all countries should work together to respond to the pandemic and maintain global public health security. Nevertheless, during this pandemic, the U.S. government has still imposed sanctions on countries such as Iran, Cuba, and Venezuela, which made it difficult for the sanctioned countries to obtain needed anti-pandemic medical supplies in a timely manner, and posed threats to the people’s rights to life and health in the sanctioned countries. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, expressed on March 24, 2020, that in the case of a global pandemic, sanctions would hinder medical work and increase risks for everyone. She argued that to maintain global public health security and protect the rights and lives of millions of people in sanctioned countries, sanctions should be relaxed or suspended in certain sectors. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, the Special Rapporteur on human rights for safe drinking water and sanitation, and the Special Rapporteur on the right to education issued a joint statement on May 6 stating that the U.S. sanctions on Venezuela were seriously harming the human rights of the people in the country. They urged the United States to immediately lift sanctions that exacerbated the suffering of the people when the pandemic raged in the country.
