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孤独这种流行病吞噬着我们的生命
How Social Isolation Is Killing Us
My patient and I both knew he was dying.
我和我的病人当时都知道他将不久于人世。
Not the long kind of dying that stretches on for months or years. He would die today. Maybe tomorrow. And if not tomorrow, the next day. Was there someone I should call? Someone he wanted to see?
不是那种会拖上几个月甚至几年的濒死状态。他可能会在当天死去。也可能是明天。如果不是明天,那就是后天。我应该电话通知某个人,某个他想见到的人吗?
Not a one, he told me. No immediate family. No close friends. He had a niece down South, maybe, but they hadn’t spoken in years.
这样一个人不存在,他告诉我。没有直系亲属。也没有亲密的朋友。他或许在南部有一个侄女,但他们好多年都没交谈过了。
For me, the sadness of his death was surpassed only by the sadness of his solitude.
在我看来,唯有他的孤独所带来的伤感,能压过他的死亡所带来的伤感。
Every day I see variations at both the beginning and end of life: a young man abandoned by friends as he struggles with opioid addiction; an older woman getting by on tea and toast, no longer able to clean her cluttered apartment. In these moments, it seems the only thing worse than suffering a serious illness is suffering it alone.