英伦广角【整理】2014-09-20 英国展开埃博拉疫苗人体试验 志愿者接受注射

 - Are you happy to go ahead?

 

- Yes.

 

- Now you have any questions?

 

- No.

 

Without a hint of nerves, the first person to have an experimental Ebola vaccine¹ takes the plunge². Ruth Atkins is one of 60 healthy volunteers in Britain to be given a jab as part of a clinic trial and she's paid just 380 pounds, not for the risk, but for any loss of earnings³. The vaccine's cleared tests in monkeys, but scientists need to be sure it's safe and effective before using it on the front line of the Ebola epidemic⁴.

 

- My 15-year-old son, he thought it was Ebola I'm having and he asked was I going to die and where is my will and how much do they get. My 12-year-old daughter was concerned but also said well done mum for what you're doing. This is that one step I'm a part of that first step and you get some vaccine they know they got the right vaccine and they can start giving it and that's gonna make a difference in people's lives.

 

The vaccine is made from harmless virus common in chimpanzees that has been modified to carry a small piece of Ebola DNA⁵. Once in patients, the virus will make a single Ebola protein. It won't cause the disease, but it should be enough to prime the immune system to attack the Ebola virus if it's ever encounter in future.

 

- The good thing about this vaccine is it probably doesn't need to work for 5 years or even 5 months if it had higher efficacy for 2 or 3 months, that would be very valuable and technically⁶ that's easier to do than to make a vaccine that works for a decade.

 

Volunteers would be given varying amount of vaccine to find a dose that triggers a good immune response without causing serious side-effects. Normally it would take 18 months or more for a vaccine to go through clinic trials but such as the desperate need to protect health workers who are putting their lives on the line by treating Ebola patients that this one is being fast tracked even while clinic trials are underway. GlaxoSmithKline is producing 10,000 doses ready to be sent out to west Africa as soon as they get the green light. But there won't be anywhere near enough of the vaccine for local people. The Ebola epidemic is out of control in the Sierra Leone and Liberia and the doctors who discovered the virus told Sky New that thousand of people are still likely to die.

 

- One of lessons is that, of this epidemic is that we need to make sure that we accelerate the ways that we test and evaluate the drugs, vaccines⁷ also. If we would have done it in the beginning of the epidemic, we would probably already have an answer.

 

Quarantine of patients and rapid tracing of their contacts is currently the only way to beat the virus. The World Health Organization has welcomed 3000 US military personnel being sent to the region to build field hospitals with 1,700 beds. It's not enough, but it's a start.  

 

Thomas Moore, Sky News

1 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。

2 plunge   

v.跳入，(使)投入，(使)陷入；猛冲

参考例句：

• Test pool's water temperature before you plunge in.在你跳入之前你应该测试水温。
• That would plunge them in the broil of the two countries.那将会使他们陷入这两国的争斗之中。

3 earnings   

n.工资收人；利润，利益，所得

参考例句：

• That old man lives on the earnings of his daughter.那个老人靠他女儿的收入维持生活。
• Last year there was a 20% decrease in his earnings.去年他的收入减少了20%。

4 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。

5 DNA   

(缩)deoxyribonucleic acid 脱氧核糖核酸

参考例句：

• DNA is stored in the nucleus of a cell.脱氧核糖核酸储存于细胞的细胞核里。
• Gene mutations are alterations in the DNA code.基因突变是指DNA密码的改变。

6 technically   

adv.专门地，技术上地

参考例句：

• Technically it is the most advanced equipment ever.从技术上说，这是最先进的设备。
• The tomato is technically a fruit,although it is eaten as a vegetable.严格地说，西红柿是一种水果，尽管它是当作蔬菜吃的。

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。