Stepping into the spotlight

Liu Qing hasn’t slept well for months. Every day, the 13-year-old middle school student wakes up with dark circles around her eyes. She has lost interest in everything and doesn’t want to talk to anyone. She knows what this sinking feeling means.
刘青（音）已经几个月都没睡好觉了。这名13岁的中学生每天都顶着黑眼圈醒来。她对所有事情都失去了兴趣，也不想和任何人说话。她知道这种颓废感意味着什么。

“Living like this is such a torture for me. I can’t feel happy at all,” Liu told Xinhua.
“对我来说，像这般活着是一种折磨。我一点也感觉不到快乐，”刘青在接受新华社采访时表示。

Liu is one of many who suffer from depression. According to World Health Organization (WHO), about 264 million people around the world are affected by depression. In China, depression affects 54 million people and is one of the leading causes of suicide.
刘青是众多抑郁症患者中的一位。据世界卫生组织统计，全球约2.64亿人受抑郁症困扰。在中国，抑郁症患者人数达5400万，抑郁症也是自杀的主要诱因之一。

To bring this issue to people’s attention, Zhang Nan, a photo studio owner in Wuhan, Hubei province, started a photo project called Crinkled Fog. Over the last three years，he has taken pictures of over 100 people struggling with mental health, mostly girls or women, aged 14 to 30.
为了引起人们的重视，湖北武汉一家摄影工作室负责人张楠发起了一个名为《皱起的雾》的拍摄项目。在过去三年间，他为100多位饱受精神健康问题折磨的人拍摄了照片，其中大多为14-30岁的女性。

“Although things have been better with people talking openly about it nowadays, there are still misunderstandings about mental illness,” the 27-year-old told China Daily.
“虽然现在情况有所好转，人们能够公开谈论精神疾病，但仍对其存在误解，”这位27岁的摄影师在接受《中国日报》采访时表示。

The 100th person Zhang shot for the series is a 23-year-old from Nanjing, Jiangsu province, nicknamed Yaya. She was diagnosed with depression in 2013 during her first year in senior high school when her grandfather, who raised her, passed away.
张楠为这一系列所拍摄的第100位抑郁症患者是来自江苏南京的23岁女孩牙牙。2013年她读高一,把她一手带大的爷爷去世了，而她被诊断患上了抑郁症。

Her parents, who do business in another city and only see her a few times a year, didn’t take her struggle seriously and believed that depression is just like a cold and will go away on its own.
她的父母在另一座城市做生意，每年只回来看她几次。他们没把她的病当回事，认为抑郁症就和感冒一样，自己会好的。

But for Yaya, it was painful. During her darkest period, she received electroconvulsive therapy 10 times within six weeks.
但对牙牙而言，这很痛苦。在她人生最黑暗的时期，她在六周内接受了10次电休克治疗。

Yaya applied for the photo shoot when she got better this year because she wanted to record the moment and tell people that they can recover.
今年，牙牙病情好转，她申请参加拍摄，因为她想记录当下，告诉人们抑郁症患者可以恢复健康。

Depression is, in fact, a real illness. “Just like your body, your moods can fall ill, too,” said Li Songwei, Tsinghua University assistant professor of psychology. “When depression can be diagnosed, no matter how terrible it is, there are effective treatments.”
实际上，抑郁症是一种真实的疾病。“就和你的身体一样，情绪也会生病，”清华大学心理学副教授李松蔚表示。“一旦确诊抑郁症，无论多么严重，都存在有效的治疗方法。”

A major problem is that people are ashamed of the illness and don’t seek professional help, Lu Lin with the China Academy of Sciences said at the recent Tencent Medical Enlightenment Summit.
主要问题是，人们觉得这个病很丢人，不会寻求专业人士的帮助，中国科学院院士陆林在最近举办的腾讯医学ME大会上表示。

“We must remove the stigma and the shame by actively and openly supporting our friends and family members who are experiencing depression,” Bernhard Schwartlander, former WHO representative in China, told China Daily.
“我们必须积极、公开地支持患抑郁症的亲友，来消除这种污名和羞愧感，”前世界卫生组织驻华代表施贺德在接受《中国日报》采访时如此表示。

以上文章内容选自《21世纪学生英文报高中版》，详情请见《21世纪学生英文报高中版》高一817期