VOA标准英语2014--Five Patients Given Experimental Ebola Drug Said To Be Improving

 

Five Patients Given Experimental Ebola Drug Said To Be Improving

The World Health Organization has approved the use of experimental treatments for Ebola patients in West Africa. The Ebola outbreak there is unprecedented¹, the disease deadly. The number of people who have died from Ebola has surpassed 1,200. There are ethical² considerations of allowing experimental drugs to be used.

Without specific drugs or a vaccine³ for Ebola, the only thing doctors can do for those suffering from this disease is treat their symptoms and hope their bodies can fight the virus.

Ebola is killing⁴ at least half of those who get it.

Experimental drugs have been tried on six people: three Westerners and now, three African doctors.

One of the Westerners, a Catholic priest who was working in Liberia, has died. Reports say the other five are improving. It's still not known if the drug has helped.

The drug they received is Zmapp. The company says all the available supplies are already exhausted⁵.

There are also about 1,000 doses of an experimental vaccine available, which may be used in West Africa. Neither of these treatments has been tested on human beings.

The World Health Organization decided⁶ that the desperate situation justifies⁷ the use of experimental drugs.

Dr. Robert Klitzman from Columbia University addressed some of the ethical issues in a Skype interview.

"Does it work? What should we tell people? What if it makes people worse? We want to make sure people understand that there are risks involved. If we have a limited supply, we need to decide who should get the vaccine or medication and who should not," said Klitzman.

Klitzman says in some sub-Saharan African languages, there's a word for "cure," but nothing that translates the word "experimental."  He says anyone who receives an experimental drug has to be told it might not cure them, and if it might make the situation worse.

Dr. Chandrakant Ruparelia an infectious disease expert at Jhpiego, an organization that trains health care workers in Liberia. He says even if there were a large supply of these treatments, an untested drug has to be monitored.

“That’s an experimental medication still.  It cannot be used on a large scale for every patient," said Ruparelia.

Klitzman agrees.

"We need to give it in a controlled way where we can see who got it, what happened, does it work, does it make them worse?," he said.

Other vaccines⁸ and treatments are being developed, but are not likely to be used to treat Ebola patients, even in an experimental form, at least not for this unprecedented outbreak.

1 unprecedented   

adj.无前例的，新奇的

参考例句：

• The air crash caused an unprecedented number of deaths.这次空难的死亡人数是空前的。
• A flood of this sort is really unprecedented.这样大的洪水真是十年九不遇。

2 ethical   

adj.伦理的，道德的，合乎道德的

参考例句：

• It is necessary to get the youth to have a high ethical concept.必须使青年具有高度的道德观念。
• It was a debate which aroused fervent ethical arguments.那是一场引发强烈的伦理道德争论的辩论。

3 vaccine   

n.牛痘苗，疫苗；adj.牛痘的，疫苗的

参考例句：

• The polio vaccine has saved millions of lives.脊髓灰质炎疫苗挽救了数以百万计的生命。
• She takes a vaccine against influenza every fall.她每年秋季接种流感疫苗。

4 killing   

n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财

参考例句：

• Investors are set to make a killing from the sell-off.投资者准备清仓以便大赚一笔。
• Last week my brother made a killing on Wall Street.上个周我兄弟在华尔街赚了一大笔。

5 exhausted   

adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的

参考例句：

• It was a long haul home and we arrived exhausted.搬运回家的这段路程特别长，到家时我们已筋疲力尽。
• Jenny was exhausted by the hustle of city life.珍妮被城市生活的忙乱弄得筋疲力尽。

6 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

7 justifies   

证明…有理( justify的第三人称单数 )； 为…辩护； 对…作出解释； 为…辩解（或辩护）

参考例句：

• Their frequency of use both justifies and requires the memorization. 频繁的使用需要记忆，也促进了记忆。 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓
• In my judgement the present end justifies the means. 照我的意见，只要目的正当，手段是可以不计较的。

8 vaccines   

疫苗，痘苗( vaccine的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His team are at the forefront of scientific research into vaccines. 他的小组处于疫苗科研的最前沿。
• The vaccines were kept cool in refrigerators. 疫苗放在冰箱中冷藏。