VOA常速英语2014--城市化可能带来健康风险（在线收听）

Urbanization Can Bring Health Risks 城市化可能带来健康风险

New research shows urbanization may be bad for people's health, unless planners develop cities that allow healthier lifestyles and environments. The U.N. estimates much of the developing and developed world will be urbanized by 2050.

一项新的研究表明城市化可能会对人们的健康带来危害,除非规划者们发展城市,打造更为健康的生活方式和环境。联合国估计大部分的发展中和发达国家到2050年将完成城市化进程。

Rural sub-Saharan Africa is seeing rapidly increasing urbanization. Something, researchers say, “could lead to an explosion” in rates of heart disease and diabetes.

非洲地区撒哈拉以南正在加速城市化进程。研究人员表示这会带来心脏病和糖尿病发病率“爆炸性的增加”。

They estimate more than a half-billion people now live in rural areas of the continent, where there are lower rates of non-communicable diseases. But that's changing and they warn that even small changes toward urbanization could affect health.

他们估计现在约有超过5亿人生活在这片大陆的偏远地区,这里有着相对而言较低的非传染性疾病发病几率。但这种境况正在发生改变,研究人员警告称城市化即使是小的改变也可能对健康造成影响。

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Dr. Manjinder, joint senior author of the study, which appears in the journal PLOS Medicine, said, “We think in lots of low and middle income countries around the world-and not specifically to countries in Africa -that one is going to see a massive change in the burden of such diseases, such as diabetes and heart disease. And this comes together with an existing high burden of endemic infection and chronic infectious diseases, but also this parallel rise in these noncommunicable diseases.”

期刊《公共科学图书馆?医学》杂志上这项联合研究的资深作家曼吉德博士说道:“我们认为世界上许多中低收入国家，并非特指非洲国家—人们会发现诸如糖尿病和心脏病等疾病负担发生巨大的改变。现有的高流行感染和慢性传染病会使得这些疾病发病率上升,而且非传染性疾病也会平行上升。”

He said chronic infections can worsen the effects of noncommunicable diseases that accompany urbanization.

他表示慢性感染会伴随城市化的影响加重非传染性疾病的发病几率。

“Chronic infections can lead to an increased risk of such diseases. For example, HIV, its treatment and the potential risk of those factors on heart disease and diabetes risk. We know that Hepatitis C virus is an oncogenic virus. It's a cancer causing virus and together with HIV may increase the risk of cancers.”

“慢性感染会导致这些疾病风险的增加。例如,艾滋病毒的治疗和潜在风险因素是心脏病和糖尿病。我们知道,丙型肝炎病毒是一种致癌病毒。这种癌会引发病毒并且连带艾滋病毒一起会增加癌症的风险。”

Urbanization does have an upside with greater access to education and healthcare, for example. But researchers warn it can be a double-edged sword.

城市化也有积极的一面，比如更广范围的教育和医疗。但研究人员警告称这是一把双刃剑。

With urbanization there are also lifestyle changes, such as adopting a more Western diet that's high in fat, sugar and salt, less physical activity, greater alcohol consumption and weight gain.

随着城市化进程带来生活方式的改变,诸如越来越多高脂肪,高糖及高盐的西方饮食,身体锻炼会变得更少,随之而来是更多的酒精摄入，最后造成体重增加。

“We can see a compounding effect of all these inter-related risk factors on increasing the burden of risk. And I think Africa is a good example of trying to understand urbanicity, but also it's a good example of where this could occur again in other regions around the world where similar events and scenarios and environments are occurring.”

“我们可以看到所有这些相互关联的风险因素产生综合效应增加的风险。我认为非洲是试图理解城市化很好的例子，而且也是很好的例子,因为这可能发生在世界其他地区,类似的事件和场景和环境正在上演。”

Dr. Sandhu is with the Department of Public Health and Primary Care at the University of Cambridge and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute.

剑桥大学卫生行政部门和初级保健及维康信托桑格研究所桑德博士说道。

Researchers base their findings on more than 7,300 people living in 25 villages in Uganda. Each person in the study was given-what's called-an urbanicity score. It measured lifestyle risk factors as rural areas became more urbanized.

研究人员对在乌干达25个村庄生活的超过7300人进行了调查。这项研究中的每个人都要给出城市化程度的评分。它是衡量偏远地区城市化进程中生活方式的危险因素。

“The interesting thing about studying rural communities is that one can see that the civil infrastructure is relatively nascent. It's a building and growing infrastructure. And if one can think about what facets of that changing infrastructure is potentially associated with risk of noncommunicable diseases, one may think about addressing and perhaps changing or building an environment that is more conducive to a healthy lifestyle.”

“研究农村社区的有趣之处在于民用基础设施相对新生。基础设施正处于建设当中且正在不断增长。如果想到基础设施的改变可能与非传染性疾病风险的增加挂钩,那就要考虑解决办法并可能改变或打造一种更有利于健康生活方式的环境。”

Sandhu said risk factors created by urbanization should be considered when coming up with replacements for the expiring Millennium Development Goals.

桑德表示城市化带来的风险因素在千年发展目标到期时应该受到重视。

“I think that should be a paramount goal to at least consider how the impact of those changing civil infrastructures are potentially leading to a change in lifestyle and other behavioral risk factors that are leading to an increased risk of chronic diseases, such as diabetes and heart disease.”

“我认为这应该是一个重要的目标，至少考虑民用基础设施的改变可能影响生活方式，而且其他行为风险因素导致如糖尿病和心脏病等慢性疾病的风险增加。”

Joining Cambridge researchers in the study were those from the Uganda Virus Research Institute, Australia's Deakin University and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

这项研究中剑桥大学的研究人员们来自乌干达病毒研究所，澳大利亚迪肯大学及伦敦卫生和热带医学学院。