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This originally appeared ongatesnotes.com.
Foreign aid is often in the hot seat, but today the heat is cranked up especially high. The United States government, one of the world’s most influential donors, is considering dramatic cuts to health and development programs around the world. I understand why some Americans watch their tax dollars going overseas and wonder why we’re not spending them at home. Here’s my answer: These projects keep Americans safe. And by promoting health, security, and economic opportunity, they stabilize vulnerable parts of the world.
对外援助往往让人坐立不安，现在尤其令人如坐针毡。美国政府，这个世界上最有影响力的捐助者之一，正在考虑大幅削减全球的卫生和发展计划。我明白为什么有些美国人盯着流向海外的民脂民膏不放，他们是想知道为什么这些钱不能为国内所用。这是我的答案：这些项目保障了美国人的安全。通过促进健康，安全和提供经济机会，他们使世界上那些脆弱的地区趋于稳定。
This is a lesson I’ve learned myself. When I first got involved in health and development more than 15 years ago, the main motivation was to save and improve people’s lives around the world. That’s still true today, but over the years I have come to see the tangible ways in which American aid benefits Americans too.
这是我学到的一课。超过15年前，首次参加健康和发展计划时，我的主要动机是拯救世界各地的生命和改善他们的生活。今天这仍是事实。但多年来，我也看到了一些对外援助使美国人受益的实实在在的途径。
For one thing, it helps prevent epidemics. The most recent Ebola outbreak in West Africa killed more than 11,000 people, but the death toll would have been much worse if the disease had spread widely in neighboring Nigeria, an international travel hub that’s home to 180 million people. What contained it? Among other things, a group of health workers who were stationed there for an anti-polio campaign. They were quickly reassigned to the Ebola fight, and their efforts helped stop the disease—and keep it from crossing the Atlantic to the United States.
一个例子是，它帮助阻止了传染病的传播。西部非洲近期爆发了埃博拉疫情，导致11,000多人死亡。如果该传染病扩散到邻国尼日利亚，那么死亡人数将更加严重。尼日利亚是拥有1.8亿人口的国际旅行中心。什么因素控制了疫情？其中之一是，一队驻扎在那里，负责反脊髓灰质炎行动的卫生工作者。他们很快被重新分配任务，参加到与埃博拉的斗争中。他们的努力帮助阻止了疫情的发展，防止了传染病跨越大西洋来到美国。
Anti-polio work is protecting Americans and helping us get ready for the next epidemic.
抗脊髓灰质炎的工作正在保护美国人，帮助我们为下一个传染病做好准备。
The biggest public funder of anti-polio work has been the U.S. government, and for good reason. It is protecting Americans and helping us get ready for the next epidemic, which could be orders of magnitude deadlier than Ebola. To stop emerging diseases, we need the infrastructure built by consistent funding of well-run health programs.
抗脊髓灰质炎工作最大的公共资助者是美国政府，而且理由很充分。它正在保护美国人，帮助我们为下一个传染病做好准备。它的致命程度可能比埃博拉高几个数量级。为了阻止新出现的疾病，我们需要通过始终如一地资助运行良好的项目来建设基础设施。
Another example is America’s global HIV/AIDS effort, known as PEPFAR, which began under President George W. Bush and works with some of the world’s poorest countries. PEPFAR is an undeniable success. There are 11 million people with HIV who are alive today because of the medicines that it provides. Many more never got the virus in the first place because of prevention efforts supported by PEPFAR.
另一个例子是美国的全球HIV/AIDS项目，被称为PEPFAR。该项目始于乔治·布什总统，并与一些世界上最贫穷的国家开展了合作。 PEPFAR取得了无可辩驳的成功。因为该项目提供的药物，1100万名艾滋病毒感染者今天仍然活着。因为PEPFAR支持的预防项目，更多的人则从未感染到这种病毒。
ThePresident's Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief(PEPFAR/Emergency Plan) is a United States governmental initiative to address the global HIV/AIDS epidemic and help save the lives of those suffering from the disease, primarily in Africa.
From WIKI
This is not simply a humanitarian accomplishment. For those countries it means more teachers, entrepreneurs, police officers, and health-care workers contributing to strong, stable societies. According to one bipartisan study, political instability and violent activity in African countries with PEPFAR programs dropped 40 percent between 2004 and 2015. Where there was no PEPFAR program, the decline was just 3 percent.
这不仅仅是人道主义的成就。对于这些国家，它意味着更多的教师，企业家，警察和医疗保健工作者能为强大而稳定的社会做出贡献。两党共同开展的一项研究显示，在2004年至2015年期间，开展PEPFAR项目的非洲国家的政治不稳定和暴力活动下降了40％。而没有开展PEPFAR项目的国家，只下降了3％。
Better health puts nations on the path to self-sufficiency. How? When health improves, people decide to have fewer children, because they’re confident that the children they do have will survive into adulthood. As family size drops, it gets easier for countries to feed, educate, and provide opportunity for their people—and that is one of the best ways to stabilize any vulnerable region.
更好的健康使各国走上自给自足的道路。这是如何办到的呢？当健康得到改善时，人们决定减少生育的次数，因为他们相信孩子会长大成人。随着家庭规模的下降，各国更容易为其人民提供食物，教育和更多的机会，这是稳定脆弱地区的最佳途径之一。
A more stable world is good for everyone. But there are other ways that aid benefits Americans in particular. It strengthens markets for U.S. goods: of our top 15 trade partners, 11 are former aid recipients. It is also visible proof of America’s global leadership. Popular support for the U.S. is high in Africa, where aid has such a dramatic impact. When you help a mother save her child’s life, she never forgets. Withdrawing now would not only cost lives, it would create a leadership vacuum that others would happily fill.
一个更稳定的世界对每个人都有好处。但是其他一些途径令美国人特别受益。它拓宽了美国商品的市场范围：美国前15大贸易伙伴中，11个以前是受援者。这也是美国全球领导地位的看得到的证明。非洲对美国的民众支持度很高，援助起到了巨大的作用。当你帮助一位母亲挽救了她孩子的生命，她永远不会忘记。现在退出资助计划不仅将以生命为代价，还会创造领导力真空，其他国家会很乐意来填补这个空缺。
The world will not be a safer place if the U.S. stops helping other countries meet their people's needs.
如果美国停止帮助其他国家满足他们人民的需要，世界不会变得更安全。
Syria is a tragic example of what can happen when the key ingredients of stability don’t come together. Beginning in 2007, the country experienced the worst drought in its history, driving more than a million people from rural areas into the cities, stoking political tension, and laying the foundation for the horrific civil war that continues today. Of course there were many causes of that war, and not every country that has a severe drought collapses as badly as Syria did. But the world will not be a safer place if the U.S. stops helping other countries meet their people’s needs.
叙利亚是一个悲剧性的例子-当稳定的关键要素没有形成合力时会发生什么。2007年年初，该国经历了历史上最严重的干旱，迫使一百多万人从农村地区进入城市，引发了政治紧张局势，为延续至今的可怕内战提供了滋生的土壤。当然，这场战争有许多原因，并不是每个发生了严重干旱的国家都像叙利亚那样崩溃。但如果美国停止帮助其他国家满足他们的人民的需要，世界将不会变得更安全。
None of this is lost on our military leaders. More than 120 retired generals and admirals recently wrote a letter to Congress arguing that U.S. programs “are critical to preventing conflict and reducing the need to put our men and women in uniform in harm’s way.” Secretary of Defense James Mattis famously said, back when he was commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and other hotspots: “If you don’t fully fund the State Department”—which runs many of America’s key programs—“then I need to buy more ammunition.”
我们的军事领导人对这些重点了然于胸。120多名退休陆海军将领最近写信给国会，论证了对外援助计划“对于防止冲突和减少派遣美国男女军人到危险地带的需要”的重要性。当他还是美军驻阿富汗，巴基斯坦和其他热点地区任指挥官时, 国防部长詹姆斯·马蒂斯（James Mattis）说了一句名言：“如果你没有提供给外交部充足的资金” - 该部门管理着美国的许多关键计划 - “那么我就需要购买更多的武器弹药。”
Protecting Americans, preventing epidemics, strengthening markets, saving lives: aid delivers phenomenal benefits, and for a bargain. It represents less than 1 percent of the federal budget, not even a penny out of every dollar. It is some of the best return on investment anywhere in government. This money is well spent, it has an enormous impact, and it ought to be maintained.
保护美国人，预防传染病，拓宽市场，拯救生命：对外援助带来了显著的好处，而且很便宜。 它占联邦预算的1％还不到，相当于从一美元中拿出不到一美分。 这样的回报在政府任何投资中都是最好的。 这钱花得物有所值。它影响巨大，应该延续下去。
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PS：后记
20170325：今天正好读到本期经济学人关于Trump对外政策时发现一段和Bill Gates的逻辑非常想通。特摘录如下。
No doubt some of the money spent on aid and diplomacy is wasted. But they account for only 1% of federal expenditure, and cutting them could do great harm. Aid helps make poor countries richer and therefore more stable. Soft power is cheaper than hard power, and nearly always a necessary complement to it. Forexample, afterAmerica helps its Iraqi allies to defeat Islamic State, it will need diplomacy and aid to make sure that the terrorist group does not make a comeback. Mr Trump’s secretary ofdefence, General James Mattis, once put it well: “Ifyou don’t fund the State Department fully, then I need to buy more ammunition ultimately.” Multilateral institutions such as the
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