美国科学60秒 SSS 2015-01-15
时间：2018-12-24 作者：英语课 分类：2015年Scientific American(一)月
英语课
This is Scientific American's Sixty-Second-Science, I'm Steve Mirsky, got a minute?
We expect guinea worm to be the second disease in the history of the world to be completely eradicated 1 from the face of the Earth. Former President Jimmy Carter, in a conversation with Scientific American editor-in-chief Marietta DiChristina at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City on January 12th. Can you speak to the Carter Center’s work in guinea worm and the progress since you began working on that.
Guinea worm is a horrible disease, it’s an ancient disease, it was known in the Bible as a fiery 2 serpent. It’s the origin of the Caduceus, a symbol for medical doctors. It’s a guinea worm wrapped around a stick as a matter of fact instead of a serpent.
Indeed, a health care worker extracts a guinea worm by wrapping the part of the worm that has already emerged from the skin around a stick and then slowly turning the stick to pull the rest of the worm out. The Wikipedia entry on guinea worm disease says that “this is nearly the same treatment that is noted 3 in the famous ancient Egyptian medical text, the Ebers papyrus 4, from 1550 B.C.” And victims describe the feeling at the site of the worm’s emergence 5 as like being on fire.
We began the eradication 6 of guinea worm from the face of the earth in 1986. We found the disease in 20 countries, three in Asia and the rest of them in sub-Saharan Africa. When we completed our survey we had been in 23,500 villages and we found three and a half million cases of guinea worm then. Last year we had 126 cases. So we have been very pleased so far at what the people themselves have done, who have gone into individual villages, told them what causes the disease, drinking bad water with guinea worm eggs in it, and what they can do about it. Which is primarily to use filter cloths and so forth 7 to take the eggs out of the water before they drink it.
You can hear DiChristina and Jimmy Carter talk about his efforts in women’s health and mental health on an upcoming Science Talk podcast.
Thanks for the minute, for Scientific American's Sixty-Second-Science, I'm Steve Mirsky.
1 eradicated
画着根的
- Polio has been virtually eradicated in Brazil. 在巴西脊髓灰质炎实际上已经根除。
- The disease has been eradicated from the world. 这种疾病已在全世界得到根除。
2 fiery
adj.燃烧着的，火红的；暴躁的；激烈的
- She has fiery red hair.她有一头火红的头发。
- His fiery speech agitated the crowd.他热情洋溢的讲话激动了群众。
3 noted
adj.著名的，知名的
- The local hotel is noted for its good table.当地的那家酒店以餐食精美而著称。
- Jim is noted for arriving late for work.吉姆上班迟到出了名。
4 papyrus
n.古以纸草制成之纸
- The Egyptians wrote on papyrus.埃及人书写用薄草纸。
- Since papyrus dries up and crumble,very few documents of ancient Egypt have survived.因草片会干裂成粉末所以古埃及的文件很少保存下来。
5 emergence
n.浮现，显现，出现，（植物）突出体
- The last decade saw the emergence of a dynamic economy.最近10年见证了经济增长的姿态。
- Language emerges and develops with the emergence and development of society.语言是随着社会的产生而产生，随着社会的发展而发展的。
6 eradication
n.根除
- The eradication of an established infestation is not easy. 根除昆虫蔓延是不容易的。
- This is often required for intelligent control and eradication. 这经常需要灵巧的控制与消除。