VOA慢速英语2015 乌干达出口医护人员遭批评

AS IT IS 2015-02-14 Uganda Under Fire for Exporting Health Workers 乌干达出口医护人员遭批评

The Ugandan government has set up a program to send almost 300 health care workers to work in Trinidad and Tobago. Critics say there is already a shortage of medical workers in Uganda. The move will leave many Ugandans without a healthcare provider.

For years, Uganda has suffered from a lack of healthcare workers. Many skilled health workers leave the country in search of jobs, better pay and health care centers with more resources.

The government is now making such departures even more appealing. It plans to send 283 highly skilled Ugandan health workers to Trinidad and Tobago. Twenty radiologists and one neurosurgeon are among the group, leaving Uganda with just nine professionals in those fields.

The team will also include 185 pregnancy¹ and birth experts called midwives.

The Ministry² of Foreign Affairs is hoping that workers in the program will send money back home for their families. These payments are called remittances³. The government taxes them. Ugandan officials say they will use the tax money collected to improve the health care industry.

Uganda has about one doctor for every 25,000 patients and one nurse for every 11,000 patients. The lack of medical workers leads to many preventable deaths. Pregnant women, and those who have just given birth, are among the high risk medical populations. At least 17 women die each day due to problems during labor⁴.

Janet Obuni is president of the Uganda Nurses and Midwives Union. She says it is common for nurses in the country to go unpaid⁵ for up to six months at a time. She says this is one reason that work in foreign countries is appealing.

Yet, she says, exporting workers will put many Ugandan patients in danger.

A Ugandan foreign affairs ministry spokesman says the government agencies involved have promised that the program will not endanger the lives of Ugandans. He says the government is supervising the process closely.

However, the Ugandan office of the Institute for Public Policy Research does not accept that assurance. It has taken legal action against the government. The High Court is expected to hold a hearing on the organization’s objection March 2.

Words in This Story

departure - n. the act of leaving a place

shortage – n. a state in which there is not enough of something that is needed

labor – n. the process by which a woman gives birth to a baby

endanger – v. to cause (someone or something) to be in a dangerous place or situation  

assurance – n. a strong and definite statement that something will happen or that something is true

1 pregnancy   

n.怀孕，怀孕期

参考例句：

• Early pregnancy is often accompanied by nausea.怀孕早期常有恶心的现象。
• Smoking during pregnancy increases the risk of miscarriage.怀孕期吸烟会增加流产的危险。

2 ministry   

n.(政府的)部；牧师

参考例句：

• They sent a deputation to the ministry to complain.他们派了一个代表团到部里投诉。
• We probed the Air Ministry statements.我们调查了空军部的记录。

3 remittances   

n.汇寄( remittance的名词复数 )；汇款，汇款额

参考例句：

• He sends regular remittances to his parents. 他定期汇款给他父母。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Remittances sometimes account for as much as 20% of GDP. 在这些国家中，此类汇款有时会占到GDP的20%之多。 来自互联网

4 labor   

n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦

参考例句：

• We are never late in satisfying him for his labor.我们从不延误付给他劳动报酬。
• He was completely spent after two weeks of hard labor.艰苦劳动两周后，他已经疲惫不堪了。

5 unpaid   

adj.未付款的，无报酬的

参考例句：

• Doctors work excessive unpaid overtime.医生过度加班却无报酬。
• He's doing a month's unpaid work experience with an engineering firm.他正在一家工程公司无偿工作一个月以获得工作经验。