DEVELOPMENT REPORT - AIDS Increasing in Five Countries

DEVELOPMENT REPORT – October 7, 2002: AIDS Increasing in Five Countries

By George Grow

This is the VOA Special English DEVELOPMENT REPORT.

A new American report warns that rates of infection from the AIDS virus will rise sharply by the year two-
thousand-ten. The National Intelligence Council prepared the report for the United States Central Intelligence
Agency. It says the increase will result mainly from the spread of AIDS in five countries. They are China, India,
Ethiopia, Nigeria and Russia.

The report estimates that the number of people infected in those countries could increase to between fifty-million
and seventy-five-million. That is three times the number currently estimated. It also is far more than the number
of AIDS cases expected in central and southern Africa. That number is expected to increase to as many as thirty-
five-million people.

China, India, Ethiopia, Nigeria and Russia have more than forty percent of the world’s population. Officials
warn that the increase of AIDS could harm the economic, social, political and military systems in these countries.

The report estimates that India might have as many as twenty-five-million AIDS victims by two-thousand-ten.
That is the highest estimate of any country.

The report says the AIDS virus is spreading at different rates in the five countries. It says that risky¹ sexual
activity is increasing infection rates in all five. The problem is reported to be most severe in Nigeria and Ethiopia.

For example, the report notes that in Nigeria the virus has spread from high-risk groups to the general population.
Nigeria’s government has attempted to increase public understanding of the virus that causes AIDS. The report
warns that the disease could affect one-fourth of all adults in the country within eight years.

In Ethiopia, the release of soldiers from the armed forces has greatly influenced the spread of the disease. The
report says many Ethiopian soldiers and sex workers became infected during the civil war in the nineteen-
eighties. It says Ethiopia and Nigeria have few public health services to fight the disease.

The report says that the main cause of rising AIDS infections in Russia is illegal drug use. It says the release of
large numbers of infected prisoners and rising numbers of sex workers are helping² the disease to spread. In
China, one reason the disease is increasing is because of unsafe methods in the collection and sale of blood.

This VOA Special English DEVELOPMENT REPORT was written by George Grow.

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1 risky   

adj.有风险的，冒险的

参考例句：

• It may be risky but we will chance it anyhow.这可能有危险，但我们无论如何要冒一冒险。
• He is well aware how risky this investment is.他心里对这项投资的风险十分清楚。

2 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。