VOA标准英语2010年-Jill Sheffield Fights for Moms Worldwi

Making a positive difference in maternal¹ health and reproductive choice through education, networking and organizing

Adam Phillips | New York 15 March 2010

 
Photo: FCI/Women Deliver
Jill Sheffield with staff at a clinic in Burkina Faso, where FCI has successfully implemented² an effective model of maternal health care delivery.

Related Links
Women Deliver
Women Deliver 2010 Conference
Family Care International
Carnegie Corporation of New York Programs
UN Millennium³ Development Goals
At first glance, Jill Sheffield seems to be all business as she meets with staff members to plan an upcoming Women Deliver conference. About 3,000 government leaders, women's health care workers, researchers and journalists are expected to attend.

Sheffield is the founder⁴ of Women Deliver and Family Care International, two New York-based nonprofit organizations dedicated⁵ to improving reproductive and maternal health for women around the world.

"I feel really strongly about the fact that women have rights like other people," she says, "and that they shouldn't die early in their life, giving life."

 
FCI/Women Deliver
Jill Sheffield holds a baby born to a mother at one of the FCI-affiliated maternal health clinics in Ecuador.

Connecting maternal health and international development  

Sheffield first discovered the profound connection between maternal health and international development in 1964. She was accompanying her husband on a nine-nation tour of Africa as he researched strategies for U.S. government aid for education.

"The men were in the offices in suits," she recalls. "But it was the women who were out doing things — being the teachers, being the workers in the field, being the nurses — all the while they were also mothers. Women are the ultimate multi-taskers."

Jill Sheffield was born in 1939 to liberal parents in a small, racially segregated⁶ town in central Florida.  She says her mother, a 5th grade teacher, was her most important influence.

"My mother loved teaching. She just opened doors for peoples' minds and ears and eyes, and to this day, I believe deeply that education is the silver bullet to development to poverty reduction [and] women's empowerment."

 
FCI/Women Deliver
Jill Sheffield accepting congratulations after Family Care International received the United Nations Population Award in 2008.

Reproductive choice

Sheffield says her belief in the importance of education and its link to development is closely allied⁷ to her commitment to reproductive choice. "Women need to have choices about the number and the spacing of their children. I am sure of that."

While her husband continued his research on educational development in Africa, Sheffield volunteered at a Nairobi, Kenya family planning clinic. She vividly⁸ recalls the day a 27-year-old woman came in holding a baby and carrying another baby on her back. She had been pregnant eleven times and wanted contraceptives. Sheffield was also 27 at the time. 

"And I kept thinking 'Holy smokes. You haven't had 11 pregnancies⁹, [only because] you've had the choice.' Right at that moment I decided¹⁰ women had to have those choices." 

When Sheffield and her husband returned to the United States three years later, she started developing global health and education programs for nonprofit organizations. In 1982, she became director for international education programs at the Carnegie Corporation of New York.      

Turning Point

The next turning point in her life came in 1985, she says, at a global conference in Nairobi capping off the United Nations Decade for Women. Sheffield heard a doctor with the World Health Organization estimate that every minute a woman somewhere on the planet dies from a complication related to pregnancy¹¹ or childbirth. The doctor challenged her listeners to find out why. "And I decided absolutely that's what we have to do." she says.

 
VOA - A. Phillips
Jill Sheffield founded Women Deliver and Family Care International, two New York-based nonprofit organizations dedicated to improving reproductive and maternal health for women worldwide.

Sheffield immediately sent a telegram to David Hamburg, the president of the foundation, requesting a meeting. She told him "if we're making this huge investment in education programs around the world, and the women then die, that's not a great investment.'" 

The next year, Sheffield left Carnegie to start Family Care International, or FCI. Her mission was immense: to identify the causes of maternal death worldwide and to teach governments, non-governmental organizations, and researchers how and why they should prevent it. FCI began its work with a conference attended by about 170 people, including government ministers, researchers and people from global institutions like the World Bank, UNICEF, the UN Population Fund and the WHO.   

The results, Sheffield says, have been gratifying. Within ten years, FCI created a working model to save women's lives in low resource communities in Kenya, Tanzania and Burkina Faso. It has also been responsible for scores of clinics elsewhere in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

To further the cause of women's health, Sheffield founded Women Deliver in 2007. The two organizations are closely allied and share office space. Women Deliver's mission is to generate the political will and financial support for reducing maternal mortality and providing universal access to reproductive health care. That's one of the 10 Millennium Development Goals the UN is committed to achieving by 2015.   

Through advocacy, education and networking, Jill Sheffield is delivering the message that maternal health is both a human right and a necessity for every nation's sustainable development.  
 

1 maternal   

adj.母亲的，母亲般的，母系的，母方的

参考例句：

• He is my maternal uncle.他是我舅舅。
• The sight of the hopeless little boy aroused her maternal instincts.那个绝望的小男孩的模样唤起了她的母性。

2 implemented   

v.实现( implement的过去式和过去分词 )；执行；贯彻；使生效

参考例句：

• This agreement, if not implemented, is a mere scrap of paper. 这个协定如不执行只不过是一纸空文。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• The economy is in danger of collapse unless far-reaching reforms are implemented. 如果不实施影响深远的改革，经济就面临崩溃的危险。 来自辞典例句

3 millennium   

n.一千年，千禧年；太平盛世

参考例句：

• The whole world was counting down to the new millennium.全世界都在倒计时迎接新千年的到来。
• We waited as the clock ticked away the last few seconds of the old millennium.我们静候着时钟滴答走过千年的最后几秒钟。

4 Founder   

n.创始者，缔造者

参考例句：

• He was extolled as the founder of their Florentine school.他被称颂为佛罗伦萨画派的鼻祖。
• According to the old tradition,Romulus was the founder of Rome.按照古老的传说，罗穆卢斯是古罗马的建国者。

5 dedicated   

adj.一心一意的；献身的；热诚的

参考例句：

• He dedicated his life to the cause of education.他献身于教育事业。
• His whole energies are dedicated to improve the design.他的全部精力都放在改进这项设计上了。

6 segregated   

分开的； 被隔离的

参考例句：

• a culture in which women are segregated from men 妇女受到隔离歧视的文化
• The doctor segregated the child sick with scarlet fever. 大夫把患猩红热的孩子隔离起来。

7 allied   

adj.协约国的；同盟国的

参考例句：

• Britain was allied with the United States many times in history.历史上英国曾多次与美国结盟。
• Allied forces sustained heavy losses in the first few weeks of the campaign.同盟国在最初几周内遭受了巨大的损失。

8 vividly   

adv.清楚地，鲜明地，生动地

参考例句：

• The speaker pictured the suffering of the poor vividly.演讲者很生动地描述了穷人的生活。
• The characters in the book are vividly presented.这本书里的人物写得栩栩如生。

9 pregnancies   

怀孕，妊娠( pregnancy的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Since the wartime population needed replenishment, pregnancies were a good sign. 最后一桩倒不失为好现象，战时人口正该补充。
• She's had three pregnancies in four years. 她在四年中怀孕叁次。

10 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

11 pregnancy   

n.怀孕，怀孕期

参考例句：

• Early pregnancy is often accompanied by nausea.怀孕早期常有恶心的现象。
• Smoking during pregnancy increases the risk of miscarriage.怀孕期吸烟会增加流产的危险。