BEIJING — For nearly 100 days, a Chinese doctor, Tan Qindong, was jailed for an essay he wrote. He slept beside a toilet, crammed in with other suspected criminals, with little but steamed buns to eat. But his offending article was no dissident political tract.
北京——一位名叫谭秦东的中国医生因为写了一篇文章，被关进监狱近100天。他睡在厕所旁边，和其他嫌疑犯挤在一起，除了馒头没什么东西可吃。但是，他那篇惹祸的文章并不是什么异见人士的政治短文。

Dr. Tan was arrested for writing online late last year that a popular Chinese tonic liquor appeared to be quack medicine, and a potential “poison” for many retirees who drink it every day, lured by swarms of ads on daytime television and its claims to be favored by emperors centuries ago.
谭秦东被抓是因为，去年年底他在网上发表文章说，一个卖得很好的中国滋补酒不仅药效没有得到证明，而且对那些每天喝它的人来说是潜在的“毒药”。大量的日间电视广告，以及它声称其深受几百年前的皇帝喜爱，吸引了不少退休人员购买这种酒。

He was released from a detention center this week after news of his arrest ignited a furor across China. Lawyers, doctors, even state-run news outlets have asked how the Hongmao Pharmaceutical Company, which has a record of exaggerated advertising claims, was able to persuade the police to arrest Dr. Tan for calling into question the benefits of its elixir.
谭秦东被抓的消息在中国引起轰动之后，一个拘留中心本周将他释放。中国的律师、医生甚至国有新闻媒体都想知道，只是因为谭秦东对药酒的功效提出质疑，鸿茅国药股份有限公司是如何说服警方将他逮捕的。该公司有夸大广告宣传的记录。

After he was freed on Tuesday, Dr. Tan told reporters that he had been in despair after he was arrested in December. But he said he was now unrepentant.
谭秦东周二获释后对记者说，去年12月被抓后，他曾一度感到绝望。但他说，他现在不后悔。

“It was right to write this essay,” Dr. Tan said in a video interview produced by Beijing News, a newspaper and a website. “You must speak the truth a couple of times in your lifetime, and especially if a doctor doesn’t speak the truth and lets these ads about miracle cures run rife, they’ll hurt even more people.”
“这样的文章写得好，”谭秦东在《新京报》报纸和网站制作的采访视频中说。“人一辈子要说两句真话，特别是作为一个医生，你如果不敢说真话，让这些漫天飞舞的神药广告漫天飞会害更多人。”

For the Hongmao company, its attempt to silence Dr. Tan has backfired monumentally.
对于鸿茅公司来说，其压制谭秦东声音的企图，已经给公司带来了严重的负面影响。

Almost overnight, he has become a public hero for challenging the company, which is the mainstay of the economy in Liangcheng County in Inner Mongolia, a region in northern China where it is based. Some seemed to allude to broader lessons about China’s tight restrictions on public debate and criticism.
几乎一夜之间，谭秦东挑战这家公司的做法，让他成为一名公众英雄。总部设在中国北方内蒙古凉城县的鸿茅公司是当地的经济支柱。一些人似乎间接提到，这件事中有中国严格限制公开辩论和批评的更广泛的教训。

“Freedom of speech and the right to exercise oversight are fundamental rights granted to citizens by the Constitution,” said an article on Thursday in Guangming Daily, a party-run newspaper. When it comes to food and medicine concerns, it added, “freedom of speech must receive particular protection.”
“言论自由与监督权，都是宪法赋予公民的基本权利，”共产党经营的《光明日报》周四发表的一篇文章这样写道。文章还说，在涉及食品和药品安全时，“必须赋予言论自由的格外保护。”

Chinese news media outlets and law experts have said that the Hongmao company and its official backers should explain who authorized his arrest and gave the police the power to spirit Dr. Tan 1,700 miles from his home in Guangzhou, a city in China’s far south, to a squalid cell in Liangcheng County.
中国新闻媒体和法律专家说，鸿茅公司及其官方后台应当解释，是谁授权警方逮捕谭秦东，并将他从2700多公里远的中国南部城市广州的家中，不可思议地带到了凉城县一间肮脏的牢房的。

“This is a fairly typical instance of the public security authorities intervening in a civil dispute; it’s an overreach of power,” Wang Yong, a professor of commercial law at the China University of Political Science and Law in Beijing, said in an interview.
“这个案件是比较典型的公安部门介入民事纠纷，属于越权，”中国政法大学商法教授王涌在接受采访时说。

The number of cases of Chinese companies mobilizing the police against critics or commercial rivals has shrunk in recent years, he said.
近年来，中国企业动员警察打击批评人士或商业竞争对手的案件数量有所减少，他说。

“But in this Hongmao Medical Tonic case, the role of the public security authorities in local protectionism has again come to the fore,” Professor Wang said. “The fundamental problem is that for a long time in Chinese law, the boundary between civil and criminal cases has been blurred.”
“但是在鸿茅药酒这个案件中，公安部门的地方保护主义又一次显现出来了。”王涌说。“根本问题在于，在我国法律中，长期以来民事、刑事案件界限模糊。”

Dr. Tan never expected such a ruckus after he published his essay criticizing Hongmao in December. He initially shared his views on a blog, which he said only a few fellow doctors read. He then spread it on WeChat, a popular Chinese social media service, where it was viewed more than 2,000 times, according to the police.
谭秦东在去年12月发表了批评鸿茅药酒的文章之后，从未料到会引起这么大的反响。他最初只是把自己的观点发表在一个博客上，他说，只有少数几个医生读过那篇博文。后来，他把文章发到了微信上，微信是一项广受欢迎的中国社交媒体平台，据警方称，微信上的文章被浏览了2000多次。

But the title of Dr. Tan’s article was eye-catching: “China’s miracle liquor, ‘Hongmao Medical Tonic,’ a poison from heaven.” Dr. Tan argued that the supposed curative effects of the 67 ingredients said to be used in the alcohol-based elixir were unclear at best, and could be dangerous for people with high blood pressure or diabetes.
不过，谭秦东文章的标题《中国神酒“鸿毛药酒”，来自天堂的毒药》很吸引眼球。谭秦东指出，该酒号称使用了67种成分，其疗效从最好的角度来看，目前还不清楚，但对高血压或糖尿病患者来说，喝酒可能有危险。

Hongmao had brushed aside these medical concerns, and its plethora of ads on Chinese television have exaggerated its powers, Dr. Tan wrote. Citing traditional Chinese medical theories, it claimed to relieve ailments like painful joints, frail kidneys, and weakness and anemia in women by combining 67 ingredients from plants and animals.
谭秦东写道，鸿茅对这些医学上的担忧置之不理，公司在中国电视台上做的大量广告夸大了药酒的功能。鸿茅引用中国传统医学理论声称，通过将67种动植物成分结合起来，鸿茅药酒能缓解关节疼痛、肾虚、软弱无力，以及女性贫血等疾病。

His essay had little initial impact. But in January, when Dr. Tan entered an elevator to his apartment, two men jumped in and showed police badges. They revealed that they were officers, sent from Inner Mongolia to detain and question him. Later, they took Dr. Tan to Liangcheng County by train and a long car ride.
谭秦东的文章最初并没有什么影响。但今年1月的一天，当谭秦东想乘电梯返货他的住所时，两名男子跟了进来，向他出示了警徽。他们自称是内蒙古派来的警官，前来拘留和审问他。后来，他们押着谭秦东上了火车，又坐了一段长途汽车，把他带到了凉城县。

There he lingered in jail for three months, arrested under Article 221 of the Chinese criminal code, a little-used provision that makes it an offense to fabricate and spread claims that seriously damage a business’s reputation.
他在那里的监狱待了三个月，逮捕他的依据是中国刑法第221条，这是一项很少使用的条款，把捏造并散布严重损害企业声誉的说法定为犯罪。

“Honestly, that time was not for humans,” Dr. Tan said after his release. “Every day I slept beside the toilet, every day I ate two and a half pieces of steamed bread. There was no freedom.”
“实话说那种日子真不是人待的，”谭秦东在获释后说。“每天就是睡在厕所边，每天吃两个半馒头，没有自由。”

Dr. Tan said thoughts of suicide crossed his mind before he steadied himself and began to accept that he could be convicted and imprisoned for a year or two. But then this week, a news report mentioned his detention and his case became a national controversy.
谭秦东说，开始的时候他想过自杀，但后来心里平静了下来，并开始接受他可能会被定罪并被监禁一到两年的可能性。不过，本周的一篇新闻报道提到了他被拘留的事情，他的案子变成了一个全国性的论战。

After the initial reports, the police in Liangcheng County at first insisted that they had plenty of evidence to support their charge.
在最初的报道出来后，凉城县的警方一开始坚称他们有足够的证据支持他们的指控。

But they wilted under the pressure and criticism of the state-run news media, as well as the Chinese Medical Doctor Association. The Supreme People’s Procuratorate, the top national prosecution office, ordered the police to release him for lack of evidence.
但是，在国有新闻媒体以及中国医师协会的压力和批评之下，凉城警方退缩了。中国最高的检察机构最高人民检察院下令警方释放谭秦东，因为证据不足。

Dr. Tan was freed on a kind of bail. But the investigation has not officially ended, and his lawyer, Hu Dingfeng, said he could still be rearrested. But if the police entirely abandon their case, Dr. Tan may seek compensation from the government, Mr. Hu said in a phone interview.
谭秦东以某种保释的形式获得了自由。但调查尚未正式结束，他的律师胡定峰说，谭秦东有可能会再次被捕。但如果警方彻底放弃他们的案子，谭秦东可能会向政府寻求赔偿，胡定峰在电话采访中说。

“I’m quite optimistic about how this case will go,” Mr. Hu said. “The case should be withdrawn, but it’s too early to say.”
“我对案件的后续走向比较乐观，”胡定峰说。“应该会撤销案件，但是现在说什么还太早。”

Meanwhile, the Hongmao Pharmaceutical Company’s attempt to silence one critic has ignited a firestorm of criticism and inquiries into its extravagant advertising. Health Times, a Chinese newspaper, estimated that Hongmao had violated rules against misleading advertising more than 2,600 times.
与此同时，鸿茅国药股份有限公司试图噤声一名批评者的做法，已经引发了对其铺张浪费大做广告的批评和调查。据中国报纸《健康时报》估计，鸿茅药酒广告违规的次数超过2600多次。

“After we heard the news this week, we took the tonic off our shelves,” Han Li, a drugstore manager in Beijing, said in an interview. “There was not notification from above; we just worried that there’d be a problem.”
“这周听到新闻，我们就把酒下架了，”北京一家药店的经理韩丽在接受采访时说。“倒不是上级有什么指示，而是我们担心酒出问题。”