VOA标准英语2008年-Study: More African Doctors, Nurses Working Abr

By Tendai Maphosa
London
11 January 2008

A new study reveals that more African doctors and nurses are working abroad than at home, which it says is contributing to the worsening shortage of health care professionals in Africa. From London, Tendai Maphosa has more in this report for VOA. 
 
The new study says some 65,000 African-born physicians and 70,000 African-born professional nurses were working overseas in developed countries by the year 2000. It says this represents about one in five African-born physicians and about one-tenth of African-born professional nurses.  According to the British government, more than 17,000 doctors and nurses from Africa were recruited in 2007 to work in Britain.  

Co-author of the report, Gunilla Pettersson of Sussex University in the UK, tells VOA that the brain drain is cause for concern.

"The health situation in Africa is dire¹, so we are very interested in the impact of these emigration flows," she said.

Pettersson says working conditions for African medical professionals must be improved to encourage them to remain in their own countries.

Analysts² have long stressed an obvious link between economic and political instability and a brain drain.

The new health care study cites several examples of countries beset³ by civil war in the 1990s such as Angola, Congo-Brazzaville, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mozambique, Rwanda, and Sierra Leone.  It says those countries lost more than 40 percent of their physicians by 2000. The report says Kenya, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe, which went through decades of economic stagnation⁴, lost more than half of their physicians.
 
The United States and the UK are among the top destinations for African health professionals.

Britain's National Health Service has a policy against directly recruiting medical personnel from sub-Saharan Africa, but it does accept African health professionals through recruitment agencies.

Abi Smith, a spokesperson for the British Medical Association, says her organization is concerned about the medical brain drain in Africa.  She says the association is encouraging African governments to improve training, working conditions and salaries for medical professionals in order to get them to stay at home.  But, she says there is also a human rights issue, the right of individuals to move about as they wish.

"People do have human rights to move, and I wouldn't like to see any policy infringe⁵ that," she noted⁶.

Mason Ford⁷, a spokesman for the international humanitarian⁸ group Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders), says donor⁹ governments are throwing hundreds of millions of dollars a year at HIV care in Africa.  But he says developed countries and international donors¹⁰ can also do more to make it more attractive for medical professionals to stay in Africa. 

"Next to nothing goes into improving the working conditions of healthcare staff," he said.  " Donors have been very, very reluctant to pay salaries of health workers or pay for training through medical college.  These measures really, really ought to be funded by the international community as well."

Ford says such assistance would provide long-term benefits for Africa by helping¹¹ to stem the brain drain.

Experts compiling the new health care study acknowledge that the brain drain is not the only problem facing health care in Africa. 

"For example, in South Africa two thirds of the physicians serve only about one-fifth of the population in the private sector," said report co-author, Gunilla Pettersson.  "Another example in Mozambique, 70 percent of the physicians live in the capital Maputo so they are thousands of miles away from the most remote parts of the country where health conditions are worse."

The study, titled "New Data on African Health Professionals Abroad," was published by the online journal Human Resources for Health.

1 dire   

adj.可怕的，悲惨的，阴惨的，极端的

参考例句：

• There were dire warnings about the dangers of watching too much TV.曾经有人就看电视太多的危害性提出严重警告。
• We were indeed in dire straits.But we pulled through.那时我们的困难真是大极了，但是我们渡过了困难。

2 analysts   

分析家，化验员( analyst的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• City analysts forecast huge profits this year. 伦敦金融分析家预测今年的利润非常丰厚。
• I was impressed by the high calibre of the researchers and analysts. 研究人员和分析人员的高素质给我留下了深刻印象。

3 beset   

v.镶嵌；困扰，包围

参考例句：

• She wanted to enjoy her retirement without being beset by financial worries.她想享受退休生活而不必为金钱担忧。
• The plan was beset with difficulties from the beginning.这项计划自开始就困难重重。

4 stagnation   

n. 停滞

参考例句：

• Poor economic policies led to a long period of stagnation and decline. 糟糕的经济政策道致了长时间的经济萧条和下滑。
• Motion is absolute while stagnation is relative. 运动是绝对的，而静止是相对的。

5 infringe   

v.违反，触犯，侵害

参考例句：

• The jury ruled that he had infringed no rules.陪审团裁决他没有违反任何规定。
• He occasionally infringe the law by parking near a junction.他因偶尔将车停放在交叉口附近而违反规定。

6 noted   

adj.著名的，知名的

参考例句：

• 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。

7 Ford   

n.浅滩，水浅可涉处；v.涉水，涉过

参考例句：

• They were guarding the bridge,so we forded the river.他们驻守在那座桥上，所以我们只能涉水过河。
• If you decide to ford a stream,be extremely careful.如果已决定要涉过小溪，必须极度小心。

8 humanitarian   

n.人道主义者，博爱者，基督凡人论者

参考例句：

• She has many humanitarian interests and contributes a lot to them.她拥有很多慈善事业，并作了很大的贡献。
• The British government has now suspended humanitarian aid to the area.英国政府现已暂停对这一地区的人道主义援助。

9 donor   

n.捐献者；赠送人；(组织、器官等的)供体

参考例句：

• In these cases,the recipient usually takes care of the donor afterwards.在这类情况下，接受捐献者以后通常会照顾捐赠者。
• The Doctor transplanted the donor's heart to Mike's chest cavity.医生将捐赠者的心脏移植进麦克的胸腔。

10 donors   

n.捐赠者( donor的名词复数 )；献血者；捐血者；器官捐献者

参考例句：

• Please email us to be removed from our active list of blood donors. 假如你想把自己的名字从献血联系人名单中删去，请给我们发电子邮件。
• About half this amount comes from individual donors and bequests. 这笔钱大约有一半来自个人捐赠及遗赠。 来自《简明英汉词典》

11 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。