VOA标准英语2014--GO Fights Ebola Fear and Stigma

 

NGO Fights Ebola Fear and Stigma¹

An NGO said containing the West Africa Ebola epidemic² will require overcoming fear and stigma surrounding the disease. ActionAid says the high death rate has caused a lack of faith in the medical system. The group is helping³ to contain the outbreak in Sierra Leone.

The World Health Organization says there have been more than 470 confirmed cases of Ebola in Sierra Leone. There are several hundred more suspected cases. More than 230 people have died.

ActionAid Country Director Mohamed Silah says the major challenge facing Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia is a poor health infrastructure⁴. He says the countries are simply not well-equipped to handle the crisis⁵ because of a lack of investment in health.

Silah said those countries need to act to change that.

“First it has to do with necessary training for the staff – equipping the staff with the basic equipment that they need to actually carry out their work. Issues as simple as an ambulance are a challenge for major hospitals. If you have a suspected case there are very limited ambulances around to collect the sick people and evacuate⁶ them.”

He said many community health centers lack access to electricity. That means no refrigeration to safely store vaccines⁷ or drugs that are susceptible⁸ to heat.

Another major problem is fear. And fear of Ebola is widespread among the population. The ActionAid country director said many people actually deny the existence of the disease and attribute the sickness and death to some other cause.

Also, the message that was sent out after the Ebola outbreak was confirmed was that it had no cure. When families did bring their sick relatives to the hospital, the patients were immediately placed in quarantine and the families lost contact with them.

"That lack of communication – that lack of clarity⁹ – brought about the mistrust. People saw the hospitals now as a death zone. What happens in the isolation¹⁰ enters was not very, very clear to the general public,” he said.

There have been several incidents in Sierra Leone where families removed infected people from hospitals. Those incidents, Silah said, not only indicate the lack of information families had about the disease, but the lack of security at the health facilities.

But what message can be sent when a disease is so often fatal? Silah said it has to do with educating communities. ActionAid staff and others are going door to door in Sierra Leone doing just that, explaining prevention methods, signs and symptoms and the importance of taking people to the hospital.

“Because we have a long time presence in the communities, they trust us. They trust the information that we give them.”

Local and traditional leaders play a big role in those education efforts.

Silah also said there’s a lack of testing centers. For example, there are just two in eastern Sierra Leone. One is run by the Ministry¹¹ of Health and the other by Doctors Without Borders. Some people may have to travel hundreds of kilometers to reach them and then wait two or three days for the results. It was during that waiting period that families removed patients from health facilities.

One thing being done to raise hope among the population is to talk about the people who became infected and survived. ActionAid, the Ministry of Health and many volunteers are sending the message that medical care gives people a chance of overcoming the disease. And they point to the nearly 130 infected people who have, so far. And those survivors¹² are now helping to educate the population through media campaigns.

“We are gaining the confidence of the people. And what you can even see from the government figures if that the number of people who are reporting to the health centers is actually increasing,” he said.

Silah is calling for greater international support for Sierra Leone to increase the number of Ebola rapid testing centers. He says this would go a long way toward controlling the outbreak.

1 stigma   

n.耻辱，污名；(花的)柱头

参考例句：

• Being an unmarried mother used to carry a social stigma.做未婚母亲在社会上曾是不光彩的事。
• The stigma of losing weighed heavily on the team.失败的耻辱让整个队伍压力沉重。

2 epidemic   

n.流行病；盛行；adj.流行性的，流传极广的

参考例句：

• That kind of epidemic disease has long been stamped out.那种传染病早已绝迹。
• The authorities tried to localise the epidemic.当局试图把流行病限制在局部范围。

3 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。

4 infrastructure   

n.下部构造，下部组织，基础结构，基础设施

参考例句：

• We should step up the development of infrastructure for research.加强科学基础设施建设。
• We should strengthen cultural infrastructure and boost various types of popular culture.加强文化基础设施建设，发展各类群众文化。

5 crisis   

n.危机，危急关头，决定性时刻，关键阶段

参考例句：

• He had proved that he could be relied on in a crisis.他已表明，在紧要关头他是可以信赖的。
• The topic today centers about the crisis in the Middle East.今天课题的中心是中东危机。

6 evacuate   

v.遣送；搬空；抽出；排泄；大(小)便

参考例句：

• We must evacuate those soldiers at once!我们必须立即撤出这些士兵！
• They were planning to evacuate the seventy American officials still in the country.他们正计划转移仍滞留在该国的70名美国官员。

7 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。

8 susceptible   

adj.过敏的，敏感的；易动感情的，易受感动的

参考例句：

• Children are more susceptible than adults.孩子比成人易受感动。
• We are all susceptible to advertising.我们都易受广告的影响。

9 clarity   

n.清澈，透明，明晰

参考例句：

• His writing has great clarity of style.他的写作风格清晰易懂。
• Mozart's music is characterized by its naivety and clarity.莫扎特的音乐特色是纯朴兴清澈。

10 isolation   

n.隔离，孤立，分解，分离

参考例句：

• The millionaire lived in complete isolation from the outside world.这位富翁过着与世隔绝的生活。
• He retired and lived in relative isolation.他退休后，生活比较孤寂。

11 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。

12 survivors   

幸存者，残存者，生还者( survivor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The survivors were adrift in a lifeboat for six days. 幸存者在救生艇上漂流了六天。
• survivors clinging to a raft 紧紧抓住救生筏的幸存者