世界最小女婴历经艰难现已健康成长

　　Tiniest Babies Are Growing Up Healthy Despite Odds

　　历经艰难，世界最小婴儿健康成长

　　CHICAGO -- One is a healthy first-grader, the other an honors college student majoring in psychology. Once the tiniest babies ever born, both girls are thriving, despite long odds when they entered the world weighing less than a pound.

　　芝加哥报道——曾经世界最小的两名女婴现都已健康成长：一个上小学一年级，另一个是心理学专业的大学荣誉学生。她们出生时都不足1磅(约454克)，能否存活还是问题。

　　The report involves Madeline Mann, born in 1989 weighing 9.9 ounces, then the world record; and 7-year-old Rumaisa Rahman, whose 9.2-ounce birth weight remains the world's tiniest. Rumaisa's birth weight was initially reported as 8.6 ounces, but that figure was based on a different conversion scale.

　　报告记录，1989年出生的玛德琳-曼恩体重是9.9盎司(约281克)，是当时世界上最小的婴儿；现在7岁的鲁美莎-拉赫曼出生时只有9.2盎司(约261克)，是目前世界上最小的婴儿。起初，由于换算标准不同，报道称鲁美莎只有8.6盎司(约244克)重。

　　Bell estimates that about 7,500 U.S. babies are born each year weighing less than 1 pound, and that about 10 percent survive. Sometimes tiny babies with zero chance of surviving show signs of life at birth, and may be able to breathe for a short time if put in an incubator and hooked up to a breathing machine and intravenous treatments. "But even so, if it's a baby that doesn't have a chance, we don't want to put the baby and the family through the discomfort," Bell said.

　　贝尔估计说，美国每年约有7500名婴儿出生时不足1磅，其中只有10%能存活。有时候，那些存活率几乎为零的小婴儿会显出一丝活力。在保育器里，吊上氧气瓶、进行静脉注射的话，他们还能呼吸一小会儿。“但就算这样，只要婴儿没有希望存活，我们一般都不会抢救，何必让婴儿和父母都遭罪。”贝尔说道。

　　Muraskas says his report highlights a sometimes overlooked fact: gestational age is even more critical for survival than size.

　　穆拉斯卡斯说，他在报告中尤为强调了可能被忽视的一点：婴儿要想存活，胎龄比体重更重要。

　　Rumaisa and Madeline were both palm-sized, weighing less than a can of soda pop the average size of an 18-week-old fetus but they were several weeks older than that. Their gestational ages almost 26 weeks for Rumaisa and almost 27 weeks for Madeline meant their lungs and other organs were mature enough to make survival possible.

　　鲁美莎和玛德琳都只有手掌大小，体重还不及一罐汽水的重量(也就是18周胎儿的平均体重)；但她们的胎龄却已超过18周。鲁美莎的胎龄是26周，玛德琳是27周。所以，她们的肺部等其他器官已经发育成熟，能保证她们可以存活下来。

　　Madeline has asthma and remains petite 4 foot 8 and about 65 pounds at age 20; Rumaisa at age 5 weighed 33 pounds and was 3 1/2 feet tall, smaller than about 90 percent of kids her age. Current information on the girls' size was not in the report; Madeline is now 22 and a senior at Augustana College in Rock Island, Ill.; Rumaisa is 7 and attends first grade in suburban Chicago.

　　玛德琳还有哮喘，20岁的她仍然身型娇小，身高4.8英尺(约146cm)，体重65磅(约29.48公斤)。鲁美莎5岁的时候是33磅(约14.97公斤)、3.5英尺(约106cm)，比90%的同龄人都小。不过，报告中没有她们最近的身高体重数据。玛德琳现在22岁，是岩岛阿古斯塔纳学院的大四学生；鲁美莎今年7岁，在芝加哥郊区读一年级。

　　Jim Mann, Madeline's father, said having a baby born so small was "terrifying" at first. But other than asthma, the only lasting effect his daughter has mentioned is having trouble finding age-appropriate clothes because she remains so small, he said. That she has done so well is a source of pride, and wonder, her dad said. "I don't know why, we were just extraordinarily lucky," Mann said.

　　玛德琳的生父吉姆-曼恩说，刚看到这么小的婴儿时觉得“很可怕”，但现在除了哮喘，他女儿唯一的麻烦就是买不到合适的衣服——她太娇小了。他又说，玛德琳现在表现得这么出色，这让他们很骄傲。“我也解释不清，只是觉得我们太幸运了吧。”他说。