Tiniest Babies Are Growing Up Healthy Despite Odds歷經艱難，世界最小嬰兒健康成長

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.芝加哥報道——曾經世界最小的兩名女嬰現都已健康成長：一個上小學一年級，另一個是心理學專業的大學榮譽學生。她們出生時都不足1磅，能否存活還是問題。

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.報告記錄，1989年出生的瑪德琳-曼恩體重是9.9盎司，是當時世界上最小的嬰兒；現在7歲的魯美莎-拉赫曼出生時只有9.2盎司，是目前世界上最小的嬰兒。起初，由于換算標準不同，報道稱魯美莎只有8.6盎司重。

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.貝爾估計說，美國每年約有7500名嬰兒出生時不足1磅，其中只有10%能存活。有時候，那些存活率幾乎為零的小嬰兒會顯出一絲活力。在保育器里，吊上氧氣瓶、進行靜脈注射的話，他們還能呼吸一小會兒。“但就算這樣，只要嬰兒沒有希望存活，我們一般都不會搶救，何必讓嬰兒和父母都遭罪。”貝爾說道。

Muraskas says his report highlights a sometimes overlooked fact: gestational age is even more critical for survival than size.穆拉斯卡斯說，他在報告中尤為強調了可能被忽視的一點：嬰兒要想存活，胎齡比體重更重要。

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.魯美莎和瑪德琳都只有手掌大小，體重還不及一罐汽水的重量；但她們的胎齡卻已超過18周。魯美莎的胎齡是26周，瑪德琳是27周。所以，她們的肺部等其他器官已經發育成熟，能保證她們可以存活下來。

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.瑪德琳還有哮喘，20歲的她仍然身型嬌小，身高4.8英尺，體重65磅。魯美莎5歲的時候是33磅、3.5英尺，比90%的同齡人都小。不過，報告中沒有她們最近的身高體重數據。瑪德琳現在22歲，是巖島阿古斯塔納學院的大四學生；魯美莎今年7歲，在芝加哥郊區讀一年級。

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.瑪德琳的生父吉姆-曼恩說，剛看到這么小的嬰兒時覺得“很可怕”，但現在除了哮喘，他女兒唯一的麻煩就是買不到合適的衣服——她太嬌小了。他又說，瑪德琳現在表現得這么出色，這讓他們很驕傲。“我也解釋不清，只是覺得我們太幸運了吧。”他說。