2007年VOA标准英语-US Navy Hospital Ship Launches Latin America Mi

By Brian Wagner
Miami
21 June 2007

A U.S. Navy hospital ship is launching a medical and humanitarian¹ mission that will include stops in 12 nations in Latin America. The crew of the USNS Comfort hopes to see 85,000 people in communities where medical care is in short supply or too expensive for many residents. VOA's Brian Wagner visited the ship off the coast of Miami, as it sailed to the Caribbean.

USNS Comfort

The floating hospital is nearly as large as an aircraft carrier, and it has equipment that rivals some large hospitals on land. The Navy deployed² the USNS Comfort to the Persian Gulf³ near the beginning of the war in Iraq, to provide care to U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians⁵ wounded in the conflict. But the Comfort's current mission will focus on helping⁶ civilians with little access to medical care in 12 Latin American nations.

The Comfort is to arrive in Belize in the coming days, where it will dock for about a week before continuing to other nations in Central America, the Caribbean and South America.

Air Force General Paul Van Sickle⁷ says military officials approached all U.S. partner nations in Latin America about possible visits by the USNS Comfort, but he says the schedule was limited to fit into the ship's 120-day deployment⁸.

"We are very happy with the schedule that we have, and it does match up with the partner nations that we are trying to show our commitment to, as well as show the compassion⁹, is what the bottom line is for this deployment," he said.

The crew of about 780 people maintain onboard facilities that include 12 operating rooms, four intensive care units, and a dentistry unit. Medical staff expect to treat adults, children and even pregnant women who may be brought aboard to deliver their babies.

The head of the Comfort's medical unit, Navy Captain Bruce Boynton, says much of the work, however, will be conducted on land.

"Primary care providers will go off the ship, set up clinics and hospitals to provide that care," he explained. "We'll also have an area where the surgeons go ashore¹⁰ to screen people that the ministries¹¹ of health have selected [as] needing surgery. Then we will bring those surgical¹² patients back to the ship."

Captain Boynton says one focus for the Comfort's crew is to perform cataract¹³ surgery for scores of patients in areas where he says there is a lack of eye surgeons. Medical staff also plan to repair cleft¹⁴ palates, perform hysterectomies, and administer a variety of medical exams on patients.

The medical crew includes military personnel as well as civilian⁴ volunteers and members of non-governmental aid groups, such as Project Hope. Robert Leitch is medical director of Virginia-based Project Hope.

"[Project] Hope itself has very close links with the pharmaceutical¹⁵ business and the medical supply business, and a lot of what we brought on here is called gifts in kind, which will be donated to the various countries that we meet," he explained.

As it sailed to the Gulf of Mexico, the USNS Comfort was packed with supplies, including medical equipment, hospital gowns, and 800 donated teddy bears to be distributed to children in the region.

The Comfort last sailed to the Gulf of Mexico in 2005, when it deployed to assist victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in the southern United States. It also took part in a 1994 U.S. mission to Haiti to treat patients and process refugees fleeing the nation's military rulers, following a coup¹⁶ against President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. The Comfort's sister ship, the USNS Mercy, was deployed in 2005 to assist victims of the Asian tsunami¹⁷.

The Comfort's latest mission is intended to last about four months, but officials say they may be asked to divert in the event of a serious hurricane during the region's annual storm season. Navy Tech Commander Carol Daniel says the crew is ready for nearly any situation during the mission.

"We have one operating room that is completely set up and ready to go, so if we had to do an emergency case five minutes from now, we could do that," she said.

President Bush authorized¹⁸ the Comfort's mission as part of an administration effort to advance the cause of social justice in the Western hemisphere. The hospital ship is scheduled to stop in Belize, Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago.

1 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。

2 deployed   

（尤指军事行动）使展开( deploy的过去式和过去分词 )； 施展； 部署； 有效地利用

参考例句：

• Tanks have been deployed all along the front line. 沿整个前线已部署了坦克。
• The artillery was deployed to bear on the fort. 火炮是对着那个碉堡部署的。

3 gulf   

n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂

参考例句：

• The gulf between the two leaders cannot be bridged.两位领导人之间的鸿沟难以跨越。
• There is a gulf between the two cities.这两座城市间有个海湾。

4 civilian   

adj.平民的，民用的，民众的

参考例句：

• There is no reliable information about civilian casualties.关于平民的伤亡还没有确凿的信息。
• He resigned his commission to take up a civilian job.他辞去军职而从事平民工作。

5 civilians   

平民，百姓( civilian的名词复数 )； 老百姓

参考例句：

• the bloody massacre of innocent civilians 对无辜平民的血腥屠杀
• At least 300 civilians are unaccounted for after the bombing raids. 遭轰炸袭击之后，至少有300名平民下落不明。

6 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。

7 sickle   

n.镰刀

参考例句：

• The gardener was swishing off the tops of weeds with a sickle.园丁正在用镰刀嗖嗖地割掉杂草的顶端。
• There is a picture of the sickle on the flag. 旗帜上有镰刀的图案。

8 deployment   

n. 部署,展开

参考例句：

• He has inquired out the deployment of the enemy troops. 他已查出敌军的兵力部署情况。
• Quality function deployment (QFD) is a widely used customer-driven quality, design and manufacturing management tool. 质量功能展开(quality function deployment,QFD)是一个广泛应用的顾客需求驱动的设计、制造和质量管理工具。

9 compassion   

n.同情，怜悯

参考例句：

• He could not help having compassion for the poor creature.他情不自禁地怜悯起那个可怜的人来。
• Her heart was filled with compassion for the motherless children.她对于没有母亲的孩子们充满了怜悯心。

10 ashore   

adv.在(向)岸上，上岸

参考例句：

• The children got ashore before the tide came in.涨潮前，孩子们就上岸了。
• He laid hold of the rope and pulled the boat ashore.他抓住绳子拉船靠岸。

11 ministries   

（政府的）部( ministry的名词复数 )； 神职； 牧师职位； 神职任期

参考例句：

• Local authorities must refer everything to the central ministries. 地方管理机构应请示中央主管部门。
• The number of Ministries has been pared down by a third. 部委的数量已经减少了1/3。

12 surgical   

adj.外科的，外科医生的，手术上的

参考例句：

• He performs the surgical operations at the Red Cross Hospital.他在红十字会医院做外科手术。
• All surgical instruments must be sterilised before use.所有的外科手术器械在使用之前，必须消毒。

13 cataract   

n.大瀑布，奔流，洪水，白内障

参考例句：

• He is an elderly gentleman who had had a cataract operation.他是一位曾经动过白内障手术的老人。
• The way is blocked by the tall cataract.高悬的大瀑布挡住了去路。

14 cleft   

n.裂缝；adj.裂开的

参考例句：

• I hid the message in a cleft in the rock.我把情报藏在石块的裂缝里。
• He was cleft from his brother during the war.在战争期间，他与他的哥哥分离。

15 pharmaceutical   

adj.药学的，药物的；药用的，药剂师的

参考例句：

• She has donated money to establish a pharmaceutical laboratory.她捐款成立了一个药剂实验室。
• We are engaged in a legal tussle with a large pharmaceutical company.我们正同一家大制药公司闹法律纠纷。

16 coup   

n.政变；突然而成功的行动

参考例句：

• The monarch was ousted by a military coup.那君主被军事政变者废黜了。
• That government was overthrown in a military coup three years ago.那个政府在3年前的军事政变中被推翻。

17 tsunami   

n.海啸

参考例句：

• Powerful quake sparks tsunami warning in Japan.大地震触发了日本的海啸预警。
• Coastlines all around the Indian Ocean inundated by a huge tsunami.大海啸把印度洋沿岸地区都淹没了。

18 authorized   

a.委任的，许可的

参考例句：

• An administrative order is valid if authorized by a statute.如果一个行政命令得到一个法规的认可那么这个命令就是有效的。