Text 3
The good news made headlines nationwide: Deaths from several kinds of cancer have declined significantly in recent years. But the news has to be bittersweet for many cancer patients and their families. Every year, more than 500,000 people in the United States still die of cancer. In fact, more than half of all patients diagnosed with cancer will die of their disease within a few years. And while it is true that survival is longer today than in the past, the quality of life for these patients is often greatly diminished. Cancer – and many of the treatments used to fight it – causes pain, nausea, fatigue, and anxiety that routinely go undertreated or untreated.
In the nation’s single-minded focus on curing cancer, we have unintentionally devalued the critical need for palliative care, which focuses on alleviating physical and psychological symptoms over the course of the disease. Nothing would have a greater impact on the daily lives of cancer patients and their families than good symptom control and supportive therapy. Yet the National Cancer Institute (NCI), the federal government’s leader in cancer research and training, spent less than 1 percent of its 1999 budget on any aspect of research or training in palliative care.
The nation needs to get serious about reducing needless suffering. NCI should commit itself to and fund research aimed at improving symptom control and palliative care. NCI also could designate “centers of excellence” among the cancer centers it recognizes. To get that designation, centers would deliver innovative, top-quality palliative care to all segments of the populations the centers serve; train professionals in medicine, nursing, psychology, social work, and other disciplines to provide palliative care; and conduct research.
Insurance coverage for palliative and hospice care also contributes to the problem by forcing people to choose between active treatment or hospice care. This “either/or” approach does not readily allow these two types of essential care to be integrated. The Medicare hospice benefit is designed specially for people in the final stages of illness and allows enrollment only if patients are expected to survive six months or less. The benefit excludes patients from seeking both palliative care and potentially life-extending treatment.
That makes hospice enrollment an obvious deterrent for many patients. And hospices, which may have the most skilled practitioners and the most experience in administering palliative care, cannot offer their services to people who could really benefit but still are pursuing active treatment.
Death is inevitable, but severe suffering is not. To offer hope for a long life of the highest possible quality and to deliver the best quality cancer care from diagnosis to death, our public institutions need to move towards policies that value and promote palliative care. (449 words)
Notes: nausea 惡心；single-minded 一心一意的；palliative 減輕的，緩解的；palliative care 姑息治療；commit oneself to 承擔(dān)去做…；insurance coverage保險(xiǎn)復(fù)蓋范圍； hospice (晚期病人)收容所，收容計(jì)劃；Medicare [美] 老年醫(yī)療保健制度 （指政府為65歲以上老人設(shè)置的醫(yī)療費(fèi)減免制度）；benefit保險(xiǎn)金；deterrent 威懾力量；制止因素；administer給予；實(shí)施，執(zhí)行。
1. According to the first paragraph, what is the author’s attitude towards the good news?
A. He believes that dramatic results have been made in cancer research.
B. He has mixed feelings about the rapid decline in deaths from cancer.
C. He deems that a large number of cancer patients still die every year.
D. He thinks many by-effects brought by cancer treatments are severe.
2. It can be learned from the text that palliative care is intended to __________.
A. raise patients’ survival rates B. extend patients’ life spans
C. improve patients’ quality of life D. provide patients with health insurance
3. According to the author, research on palliative care for cancer __________.
A. has been overlooked by the NCI B. has gained the active support of the nation
C. has been overfunded by the NCI D. is of greater significance than research on cancer cures
4. The main issue of insurance coverage for hospice care and active treatment is that __________.
A. it does not allow patients to seek both simultaneously
B. it only covers patients whose life expectancy is less than six months
C. hospice care is only covered when it may extend a patient’s life expectancy
D. it deprives patients of the right to choose between two proven treatment methods
5. Which of the following best expresses the main idea of the text?
A. Improving cancer research in the U.S. B. Alleviating the suffering of cancer patients
C. Reforming insurance coverage for cancer patients D. Choosing active treatment or palliative care for patients
Word Study
1.squeeze vt. 擠、壓、擰；塞進(jìn)；擠進(jìn)：1) He squeezed the last bit from the tooth-paste tube. (他從牙膏筒里擠出了最后一點(diǎn)牙膏。) 2) Squeeze the walnuts together to crack them. (把核桃放在一起擠壓以便敲碎它們。) 3) He squeezed an extra shirt into the suitcase. (他把又一件襯衣塞進(jìn)箱子。) 4) Can’t you squeeze more juice out of that lemon? (你能否從那個(gè)檸檬中擠出更多的汁來？) squeeze n. (經(jīng)濟(jì)術(shù)語)銀根緊的時(shí)候：We cannot borrow money during the present credit squeeze. (在目前信貸緊縮時(shí)期我們無法借到更多的錢。)
2. swing vi. 擺動(dòng)：1) His arms swing as he walks. 2) The door swung open. （門擺動(dòng)開了。） swing n. 變動(dòng)，波動(dòng)：swings in the oil price 油價(jià)波動(dòng)。用于成語：in full swing （某活動(dòng)）全面展開，達(dá)到高潮：1) Everything seemed to be in full swing there. 2) It was Saturday night; the little party was in full swing. 3) The work was in full swing when we arrived. 4) When we arrived, the meeting was already in full swing. 5) Ten weeks before the election the campaign was in full swing.
3. 經(jīng)濟(jì)方面的短語：economic decline經(jīng)濟(jì)衰退；a swing in prices價(jià)格波動(dòng)；supply-cut供應(yīng)減少；double-digit inflation兩位數(shù)的通貨膨脹；economic consequences經(jīng)濟(jì)上產(chǎn)生的后果；retail price零售價(jià)；energy conservation能源保護(hù)；oil import bill石油進(jìn)口開支；oil shock石油恐慌；energy-intensive能源密集型的；price index價(jià)格指數(shù)。
Text 4
[2004 RC Text 4 ]
Americans today don’t place a very high value on intellect. Our heroes are athletes, entertainers, and entrepreneurs, not scholars. Even our schools are where we send our children to get a practical education – not to pursue knowledge for the sake of knowledge. Symptoms of pervasive anti-intellectualism in our schools aren’t difficult to find.
“Schools have always been in a society where practical is more important than intellectual,” says education writer Diane Ravitch. “Schools could be a counterbalance.” Ravitch’s latest book, Left Back: A Century of Failed School Reforms, traces the roots of anti-intellectualism in our schools, concluding they are anything but a counterbalance to the American distaste for intellectual pursuits.
But they could and should be. Encouraging kids to reject the life of the mind leaves them vulnerable to exploitation and control. Without the ability to think critically, to defend their ideas and understand the ideas of others, they cannot fully participate in our democracy. Continuing along this path, says writer Earl Shorris, “We will become a second-rate country. We will have a less civil society.”
“Intellect is resented as a form of power or privilege,” writes historian and professor Richard Hofstadter in Anti-Intellectualism in American Life, a Pulitzer Prize winning book on the roots of anti-intellectualism in US politics, religion, and education. From the beginning of our history, says Hofstadter, our democratic and populist urges have driven us to reject anything that smells of elitism. Practicality, common sense, and native intelligence have been considered more noble qualities than anything you could learn from a book.
Ralph Waldo Emerson and other transcendentalist philosophers thought schooling and rigorous book learning put unnatural restraints on children:” We are shut up in schools and college recitation rooms for 10 or 15 years and come out at last with a bellyful of words and do not know a thing.” Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn exemplified American anti-intellectualism. Its hero avoids being civilized – going to school and learning to read – so he can preserve his innate goodness.
Intellect, according to Hofstadter, is different from native intelligence, a quality we reluctantly admire. Intellect is the critical, creative, and contemplative side of the mind. Intelligence seeks to grasp, manipulate, re-order, and adjust, while intellect examines, ponders, wonders, theorizes, criticizes and imagines.
School remains a place where intellect is mistrusted. Hofstadter says our country’s educational system is in the grips of people who “joyfully and militantly proclaim their hostility to intellect and their eagerness to identify with children who show the least intellectual promise.” (414 words)
Notes：intellect 才智，智能。entertainers 表演家。entrepreneurs 企業(yè)家。pervasive 彌漫的，滲透的，遍布的。intellectualism （哲）主知主義（主張知識(shí)為純理性的產(chǎn)物）。counterbalance 平衡力，起平衡作用的因素。anything but 根本不。distaste (for) n. 厭惡，不喜歡。populist adj.平民主義的。elitism 杰出人物統(tǒng)治論，高人一等的優(yōu)越感。complementary 補(bǔ)充的，互補(bǔ)的。civil 公民的；文明的。transcendentalist 先驗(yàn)論的。rigorous 嚴(yán)格的，嚴(yán)厲的。a bellyful of 滿腹的。innate 天生的，先天的。contemplative 沉思的。
1. What do American parents expect their children to acquire in school?
A. The habit of thinking independently. B. Profound knowledge of the world.
C. Practical ability for future career. D. The confidence in intellectual pursuits.
2. We can learn from the text that Americans have a history of
A. undervaluing intellect. B. favoring intellectualism.
C. supporting school reform D. suppressing native intelligence.
3. The views of Ravitch and Emerson on schooling are
A. identical. B. similar. C. complementary. D. opposite.
4. Emerson, according to the text, is probably
A. a pioneer of education reform. B. an opponent of intellectualism.
C. a scholar in favor of intellectualism. D. an advocate of regular schooling.
5. What does the author think of intellect?
A. It is second to intelligence. B. It evolves from common sense.
C. It is to be pursued. D. It underlies power.
