VOA标准英语2012--Fistula Surgery Changes Nigerian Women's Lives

 

Fistula Surgery Changes Nigerian Women's Lives

Allowing the patient to live a normal life and giving her back some dignity is the objective of this surgery performed in Jahun hospital, in northeast Nigeria.

Since 2008, the aid group Doctors Without Borders has operated on women with obstetric fistulas, also known as VVF.

The condition is a tear between the vagina and the bladder or the rectum. It results from a difficult or prolonged childbirth, without proper medical assistance, which provokes tissue necrosis.

Fatima Mohammed gave birth a few weeks ago.

"I spent 2 days in labor¹, and then I passed out," she said. "I was unconscious for 4 days, I don't even remember which day I gave birth. After I delivered, this is when I started having a VVF and started to leak."

Each month in Jahun, the surgeons hired by Doctor Without Borders operate on about 20 women. The fistula is not lethal², but causes a permanent incontinence. Women get soiled, smell bad, and then their lives collapse³. They are often rejected by their husband and pushed aside by the community, as Habsa Musa has experienced.

"Because I was leaking, I thought my husband was going to leave me, because he had spent so much money for me at the Birenenkudu Hospital," she said.

After the surgery, the patients have physiotherapy sessions and a psychosocial follow-up to help them get back into society. The goal is also to break the taboo⁴ over this infirmity: the V V F can be avoided and can be healed, as Jahun hospital's nurse Bilkisou Aliyou explains.

"When they come, we have different type of treatment. because some of them do not even need surgery. With catheter treatment, they can be fine. And some of them will undergo surgery and they will be fine," said Aliyou.

But the challenge is still huge. Each year, 600,000 new cases are detected. One third of them in Africa. 

1 labor   

n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦

参考例句：

• We are never late in satisfying him for his labor.我们从不延误付给他劳动报酬。
• He was completely spent after two weeks of hard labor.艰苦劳动两周后，他已经疲惫不堪了。

2 lethal   

adj.致死的；毁灭性的

参考例句：

• A hammer can be a lethal weapon.铁锤可以是致命的武器。
• She took a lethal amount of poison and died.她服了致命剂量的毒药死了。

3 collapse   

vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷

参考例句：

• The country's economy is on the verge of collapse.国家的经济已到了崩溃的边缘。
• The engineer made a complete diagnosis of the bridge's collapse.工程师对桥的倒塌做了一次彻底的调查分析。

4 taboo   

n.禁忌，禁止接近，禁止使用；adj.禁忌的；v.禁忌，禁制，禁止

参考例句：

• The rude words are taboo in ordinary conversation.这些粗野的字眼在日常谈话中是禁忌的。
• Is there a taboo against sex before marriage in your society?在你们的社会里，婚前的性行为犯禁吗？