VOA原文
And now, Words and Their Stories, from VOA Learning English.
The spread of dangerous diseases around the world is not new.
As trade and colonization expanded worldwide over hundreds of years, so did some dangerous diseases. And smallpox was one of the worst of them.
Happily, smallpox has been eradicated, meaning it does not exist in nature anymore. The story of how smallpox was defeated is closely linked to the English word, "vaccine."
However, before modern science made that happen, humans had suffered from the disease for a very long time. Researchers even found a 3,000 year old Egyptian mummy with smallpox scars.
Smallpox was a severe and deadly disease. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention describes smallpox as devastating." On average, three out of every 10 people who got it died. Those who survived were usually left with scars, which were sometimes severe."
By the 18th century, smallpox was still infecting and killing people around the world. But in England, there were some interesting stories going around about milkmaids.
Milkmaids were women who milked cows. They were known to get a mild disease called cowpox. And the scientific term for cowpox is at the heart of our story about the English word, "vaccine."
Cowpox is a disease that affects cows but can spread to humans through a scratch or cut. Cowpox would often cause a few sores, but it is not serious. Smallpox, however, can leave terrible scars at the very least and cause death at the very worst. But milkmaids did not seem to get the damaging disease.
A British doctor named Edward Jenner (1749-1823) wanted to find out if the stories were true. So, he did an experiment on his gardener's son, nine-year-old James Phipps. Jenner took material from a milkmaid's cowpox sore and injected it into the child.
The nine year old, predictably, got cowpox. But, months later when Jenner exposed Phipps to smallpox, the child never became infected.
Jenner performed this experiment on more people before publishing his findings, calling them: "An Inquiry into the Causes and Effects of Variolae Vaccinae."
The Latin term "variolae vaccinae" means something like ‘pustules from a cow.' A pustule is a small bump on the skin that contains or produces infected fluid or pus.
And, let's face it, pustule - whether in Latin or not - is a bit gross. So, it is the word "vaccine," based on the Latin word for cow - vaca - that stuck.
In time, vaccines became known as the substances that give immunity from other diseases as well.
And that is the story of the English word, vaccine ...... which brings us to the end this Words and Their Stories.
满满的知识点
colonization 美 [ˌkɑːlənəˈzeɪʃn]n. 殖民；殖民地化
smallpox 美 [ˈsmɔːlpɑːks] 天花
cowpox 美 [ˈkaʊpɑːks] 牛痘
eradicate美 [ɪˈrædɪkeɪt]
v. destroy completely, as if down to the roots
suffer from 遭受
devastating美 [ˈdevəsteɪtɪŋ]adj. causing greatdamage or harm
sore美 [sɔːr]n. a sore or painful spot on the body usually with theskin broken or bruised and often with infection
scar美 [skɑːr]n. a mark remaining (as on the skin) after injured tissuehas healed
参考译文
世界范围内的传染病并不是从来没有过。
数百年来，随着贸易和殖民在全球范围内扩张，一些危险的疾病也随之蔓延。天花是其中最严重的一种。
幸运的是，天花已经被根除了，这意味着它在自然界中不再存在了。天花被消灭的故事与英语单词“vaccine”(疫苗)有着密切的联系。
然而，在现代科学实现这一目标之前，人类已经遭受这种疾病很长一段时间了。研究人员甚至发现了一具有天花疤痕的3000年前的埃及木乃伊。
天花是一种严重而致命的疾病。美国疾病控制与预防中心称天花是毁灭性的。“平均每10个人中就有3人死亡。幸存者通常会留下伤疤，有时甚至很严重。”
到18世纪，天花仍然在世界各地感染和杀死人们。但是在英国，有一些关于挤奶女工的有趣故事流传着。
挤奶女工是挤牛奶的妇女。他们被发现患有一种叫做牛痘的轻微疾病。牛痘的科学术语是英语单词“vaccine”的核心。
牛痘是一种影响奶牛的疾病，但可以通过抓伤或割伤的伤口传播给人类。牛痘常常会引起一些疼痛，但并不严重。然而，天花至少会留下可怕的疤痕，在最坏的情况下会导致死亡。但是挤奶女工似乎没有感染这种破坏性的疾病。
一位名叫爱德华·詹纳(EdwardJenner, 1749-1823)的英国医生想要知道这些故事是否属实。于是，他在他园丁的儿子，九岁的詹姆斯·菲普斯身上做了一个实验。詹纳从一个挤奶女工的牛痘疮中提取了材料，并把它注射到孩子身上。
不出所料，这个九岁的孩子得了牛痘。但是，几个月后，当詹纳把菲普斯暴露在天花下时，这个孩子再也没有被感染。
詹纳在发表他的发现之前，在更多人身上做了这个实验，称其为“对疫苗天花的原因和影响的调查”。
拉丁语“variolaevaccinae”的意思是“来自牛的脓疱”。脓包是皮肤上的一个小肿块，含有或产生受感染的液体或脓液。
而且，让我们面对现实吧，pustule-不管是不是拉丁语-有点恶心。所以，“疫苗”这个词是根据拉丁语中表示母牛的词vaca而来的。
随着时间的推移，疫苗也被认为是能使人对其他疾病产生免疫力的物质。
这就是英语单词vaccine的故事。
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