【经济学人】啧啧啧，日本生育文化 | 2016.10.22 | 总第709期

考研英语时事阅读 · 公众号 · 考研 · 2016-11-17 05:22

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翻译 | 栏目六第二组

审核 | 开心学英语

小编 | 澜意

Maternity culture in Japan

日本生育文化

No pain, no gain

一分耕耘一分收获

Why expectant mothers in Japan don’t get pain relief

为什么日本待产妈妈仍受煎熬

Oct 22nd 2016 | TOKYO | From the print edition

2016年10月22日|东京|来自印刷版

THE Mejiro Birth House in a northern district of Tokyo is eerily quiet: no babies crying, no wails of women in labour. That, explains Yuko Hoshino, the chief midwife, is because it is empty. Only four to six babies are born there each month, compared with 14 to 16 a few years ago. The problem is not just Japan’s low birth rate. “Fewer women want a natural birth today,” she says ruefully. “They go with doctors in hospitals rather than with midwives in birth houses.”

位于东京的北面地区的目白产房安静的可怕；没有新生儿的啼叫，也没有在产孕妇的痛哭。产科护士长Yuko Hoshino解释道，因为产房里空荡荡。相比几年之前每个月会有14到16个新生儿降临，现在每个月只有4到6个新生儿。问题不仅仅是日本的低生育率。她不无遗憾地说‘现在很少有孕妇想自然生产，，他们宁愿去有医生的医院也不愿来有助产士的产房。

The culture of maternity in Japan is slowly becoming more like the rest of the rich world, but several practices differ. Women are generally treated as fragile during their pregnancy. But during labour itself they are expected to suffer. Painkillers are doled out sparingly, if at all. Doctors say growing numbers of women are keen to have an epidural (an anaesthetic injected into the spine), but few obstetric centres, hospitals included, offer them, and almost never outside normal working hours. The payment of ¥420,000 ($4,053) that the national health-insurance scheme makes towards the cost of having a baby would not typically cover one, anyway.

日本的生育文化慢慢的开始向其他发达国家靠拢，但是有的行为还是存在着差异。在怀孕期间孕妇被小心翼翼的照顾着，但是在分娩的时候却宁愿她们自然生产而受其苦。虽然如此，止痛药是很少发放的。医生说越来越多的孕妇想在脊柱上打麻药，但是很少有产科中心，包括医院会提供麻醉，而且正常工作之外的时间根本就没有。无论如何国家健康保险方案给予生育一胎的的保险补偿420000日元(4053美元)实际上根本就不够。

For most women, however, the issue is neither the cost nor the longer time it takes to recover after an epidural. Local Buddhist tradition holds that women should embrace the pain of natural childbirth. The experience is said to prepare them for the challenges of being a mother and to encourage bonding with the baby. Yoshimi Katsube, who is 35, says her parents criticised her when she told them she would be having an epidural at the birth of her first child. Nonetheless, she plans to have one again when the baby she is now expecting is born.

然而，大多数女性，既不是成本也不是麻醉后需要更长时间恢复的问题，而当地佛教的传统信仰是保持妇女自然分娩的疼痛。经验说这些是准备作为一个母亲的挑战和鼓励与孩子的联系。35岁的吉见町说，当她告诉他的父母她将会用麻醉生第一个孩子的时候，遭到父母的批评。尽管如此，正在待产的她准备生育完后再生一个。

More fathers attend births than used to be the case, but many still don’t come into the delivery room. “My husband will come to the hospital, but we have yet to decide whether he will come into the room,” says Mayuka Yamazaki, who is expecting her first child this month. “I am not sure if I want him to see me like that.”

与过去相比，现在有更多的父亲会陪伴生产，但是很多还是不会进产房，Mayuka Yamazaki这个月将生第一胎，她说，我的丈夫会来医院，但是我们还没决定他是否会进入产房，我还拿不准是否愿意他进入产房看到我生产的样子。

In most countries, the received wisdom about what women should do in pregnancy relies as much on the local culture as on science. Expectant mothers in France drink wine and eat pâté, for instance; their American counterparts see this as one step short of infanticide. In most places pregnant women would be steered away from raw fish, but not in Japan. The main obsession, however, is with body temperature. While Western mothers-to-be are advised not to get too hot, those in Japan are told to keep warm. They happily bathe in hot springs but avoid ice cream and chilled water. Restaurants offer blankets to pregnant women, even in the height of summer.

在大多数国家，女人在孕期应该做什么，地方文化中民间的习俗看法和科学见解一样多。例如，法国的准妈妈们都在此期间喝酒，吃肉酱，美国的准妈妈则将此视为杀死婴儿的一种做法。在大多数地方，怀孕的女人都避免吃生的鱼，但日本并不排斥。然而，最主要的困扰是体温。西方的准妈妈被建议不要太热了，而日本的妈妈们则被告知要保暖。他们愉快地泡温泉但却避免吃冰欺凌和冰水，即使是在高温的夏天，饭店也会为孕妇们提供毯子。

One element of the standard advice for pregnant women in Japan is worrying, however. The country has a high and rising proportion of underweight babies, defined as 2.5kg or less at birth. In 2015 9% of babies were underweight. One reason, says Zentaro Yamagata of the medical department of University of Yamanashi, is that women do not put on enough weight during pregnancy. Doctors advise their patients to put on no more than 6-10kg, compared with 11-16kg in Britain.

在日本，给孕妇的标准建议中有一条令人堪忧。这个国家婴儿体重不足占有很高比例，且比例在不断上升，体重不足定义为出生时只有2.5kg甚至是更少。在2015年，9%的婴儿体重过轻。山梨大学医学院的Zentaro Yamagata认为，原因之一是孕妇们在孕期体重不够。医生建议的病人体重增长不能超过6-10公斤，而英国是11-16公斤。

The government, which is keen to push up the fertility rate from the current 1.5 children per woman to 1.8 to slow the shrinking of Japan’s population, might ponder all this. The causes of Japan’s demographic decline are many and to some degree intractable. But making childbearing a less forbidding experience could not hurt.

期待您的翻译，您可以将翻译留言到文章底部，第二天会有详细解析哦。日本人口下降的原因很多，还有点棘手。试试减少生育痛苦是否管用倒也无妨。

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The government, which is keen to push up the fertility rate from the current 1.5 children per woman to 1.8 to slow the shrinking of Japan’s population, might ponder all this.

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【经济学人】啧啧啧，日本生育文化 | 2016.10.22 | 总第709期

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