By Michael Gwarisa
In a bid to bridge information gaps between scientific research and community understanding, AVAC has launched the Translation Index, a translation of health and scientific terms into vernacular languages for Six African countries.
The Translation Index offers health journalists accurate translations of commonly used and essential medical terms in their native languages in six African countries namely Kenya, Malawi, Uganda, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
At this time the Translation Index supports the following languages: Bemba, Cichewa, Dholuo, Kiswahili, Luganda, Ndebele, Runyankore, Shona, Tonga, and Tumbuka. We welcome additional translations, suggestions for other languages to include, and other ideas on how to improve the Index,” said AVAC through their website.
While some English terms migrate seamlessly into local languages, others need translation or explanation to help people fully understand what the terms mean and what researchers, policymakers and others are saying, hence the translation index.
“Journalists and community health workers are often at the forefront of helping people understand complicated science and health terms in their languages. Providing information in the language it will be reported in helps ensure that there are fewer errors in the reporting and that the reporting can reach a wider audience.”
Through the Media Science Café program, AVAC’s partners have been able to reach print, radio and broadcast journalists in more rural areas of Kenya, Malawi, Uganda, Tanzania, Zambia & Zimbabwe with experts speaking in local languages to explain key issues in HIV and immunization.
AVAC worked with the café conveners to develop an immunization and science translation index in 10 local languages specific to café countries.
In Zimbabwe, the Health Communicators Forum (HCF) worked to engage members from the Media Science Café Program from the country’s five provinces namely Harare, Bulawayo, Masvingo, and Mutare and Midlands to translate some key medical and science terms.
Anna Miti, the Chairperson for the HCF said there, “With health and science information it helps for communities to relate to the information so that it does not sound abstract or far off. One way of doing that is through using terms that the audience can relate such as the name of a diseases or concept. They tend to grasp it much easier in vernacular because its a term uses in the community.”
In addition she said translating medical terms into local languages makes the concepts easier to understand as translation into vernacular usually means experts have to stop using jargon. This leads to better understanding of terms.
Meanwhile, Esther Nakkazi, founder of the Health Journalists Network in Uganda and an AVAC Convener said the move to translate medical and scientific terms into local languages as a welcome development.
“Since many journalists in community radios may not be highly specialized, the translation of technical science terms into vernacular languages is essential for audience comprehension. This becomes particularly relevant during crises, as witnessed during the pandemic when different radio stations provided varying names for COVID-19 in the same language,” said Nakazi.
AVCA said the COVID pandemic shone a light on the need to share accurate and understandable information with people from all communities and highlighted a long-standing issue in talking about health in local languages that may not have readily available translations for important terms
