摘要：2013年職稱英語衛(wèi)生類閱讀理解強化訓練。

Prolonging Human Life

Prolonging human life has increased the size of the human population. Many people alive today would have died of childhood diseases if they had been born 100 years ago. Because more people live longer, there are more people around at any given time. In fact, it is a decrease in death rates, not an increase in birthrates, that has led to the population explosion.

Prolonging human life has also increased the dependency load. In all societies, people who are disabled or too young or too old to work are dependent on the rest of society to provide for them. In hunting and gathering cultures, old people who could not keep up might be left behind to die. In times of famine, infants might be allowed to die because they could not survive if their parents starved, whereas if the parents survived they could have another child. In most contemporary societies, people feel a moral obligation to keep people alive whether they can work or not. We have a great many people today who live past the age at which they want to work or are able to work; we also have rules which require people to retire at a certain age. Unless these people were able to save money for their retirement, somebody else must support them. In the United States many retired people live on social security checks which are so little that they must live in near poverty. Older people have more illness than young or middle-aged people; unless they have wealth or private or government insurance, they must often "go on welfare" if they have a serious illness.

When older people become senile or too weak and ill to care for themselves, they create grave problems for their families. In the past and in some traditional cultures, they would be cared for at home until they died. Today, with most members of a household working or in school, there is often no one at home who can care for a sick or weak person. To meet this need, a great many nursing homes and convalescent hospitals have been built. These are often profit-making organizations, although some are sponsored by religious and other nonprofit groups. While a few of these institutions arc good, most of them are simply "dumping grounds" for the dying in which "care" is given by poorly paid, overworked, and under-skilled personnel.

詞匯：

dependency n.依賴性

contemporary α.現(xiàn)代的

obligation n. 義務

insurance n. 保險

welfare n.福利

senile αdj. 衰老的

grave αdj. 嚴肅的

convalescent αdj.康復的

sponsor v. 發(fā)起，資助

institution n. 機構

注釋:

1. Prolonging human life has increased the size of the human population:延長人類生命的結果使得人口的數量有了增加。句中的 prolonging human life是動名詞短語。由動名詞短語作句子的主語時，句中動詞必須用單數形式。如 : Collecting stamps is his hobby.

2. Many people alive today would have died of childhood diseases if they had been born 100 years ago:如果今天活著的很多人生于一百年以前，他們會死于各種兒童疾病。

3. Because more people live longer, there are more people around at any given time:因為有更多的人壽命更長，所以在任何一個特定的時間里的人也就更多。

4. the dependency load: 撫養(yǎng)人口數量。

5. In times of famine: 在饑荒年代

6. go on welfare : 靠福利救濟

go on 有許多意思，其中的一個意思是"依靠……過活"。例:

Many people go on welfare when jobs become scarce.

(工作難找時，許多人靠政府救濟金過日子。)

7. grave problems: 嚴重的問題

8. convalescent hospitals: 康復醫(yī)院;療養(yǎng)院

9. profit-making organizations: 贏利機構

10. dumping grounds: 垃圾場