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第4部分：阅读理解（每题3分，共45分）阅读下面的短文。每篇短文的后面有五个问题，每个题有四个备选答案。请根据短文的内容选择最佳的答案。
New U.S. Plan for Disease Prevention
Urging Americans to take responsibility for their health¹, Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson on Tuesday launched a $15 million program to try to encourage communities to do more to prevent chronic diseases like heart disease, cancer and diabetes.
The initiative highlights the cost of chronic diseases²--- the leading causes of death in the United States --- and outlines ways that people can prevent them, including better diet and increased exercise.
“In the Unites States today, 7 of 10 deaths and the vast majority of serious illness, disability and health care costs are cause by chronic diseases,” the Health and Human Services Department said in a statement.
The causes are often behavioral --- smoking, poor eating habits and a lack of exercise.
“I am convinced that preventing disease by promoting better health is a smart policy choice for our future,” Thompson told a conference held to launch the initiative.
“Our current health care system is not structured to deal with the escalating costs of treating diseases that are largely preventable through changes in our lifestyle choices.”
Thompson said heart disease and strokes will cost the country more than $351 billion in 2003.
“These leading causes of death for men and women are largely preventable, yet we as a nation are not taking the steps necessary for us to lead healthier, longer lives,” he said.
The $15 million is slated to go to communities to promote prevention, pushing for changes as simple as building sidewalks to encourage people to walk more.
Daily exercise such as walking can prevent and even reverse heart disease and diabetes, and prevent cancer and strokes.
The money will also go to community organizations, clinics and nutritionists who are being encouraged to work together to educate people at risk of diabetes about what they can do to prevent it and encourage more cancer screening.
The American Cancer Society estimates that half of all cancers can be caught by screening, including Pap tests³ for cervical cancer, mammograms for breast cancer, colonoscopies, and prostate checks.
If such cancers were all caught by early screening, the group estimates that the survival rate for cancer would rise to 95 percent.
词汇：
diabetes 糖尿病 initiative n. 主动的行动，倡议
behavioral adj. 行为方面的 escalate vi. 逐步上升；逐步增强
slate vt. 预定，规划 nutritionist n. 营养学家
cervical adj. 子宫颈的 mammogram n. 乳房X线照片
colonoscopy n. 结肠镜检查 prostate adj. 前列腺的
注释：
1. take responsibility for their health: 承担起确保自己健康的责任
2. The initiative highlights the cost of chronic diseases… : 这一行动强调了慢性病所造成的损失……
3. Pap test (= Papanicolaou test ): 巴氏实验（一种检查早期癌变的方法）
练习：
1. Which of the following is NOT true of chronic diseases in the US?
A) They account for 70% of all deaths.
B) They are responsible for most of the health care costs.
C) They often result in unhealthy lifestyles.
D) They are largely preventable.
2. The author mentions all the following as ways of diseases prevention EXPECT
A) better diet.
B) increased exercise.
C) reduction on smoking.
D) higher survival rate for cancer.
3. The article indicates that more money spent on disease prevention will mean
A) greater responsibility of the government.
B) much less money needed for disease treatment.
C) higher costs of health care.
D) more lifestyle choices for people.
4. The $15 million program is aimed at
A) promoting disease prevention.
B) building more sidewalks.
C) helping needy communities.
D) wiping out chronic disease.
5. Early cancer screening can help reduce significantly
A) the death rates for all chronic diseases.
B) the kinds of cancer attacking people.
C) the cancer incidence rate.
D) cancer death rate.
Eat to Live
A meager diet may give you health and long life, but it’s not much fun --- and it might not even be necessary. We may be able to hang on to¹ most of that youthful vigor even if we don’t start to diet until old age.
Stephen Spindler and his colleagues from the University of California at Riverside have found that some of an elderly mouse’s liver genes can be made to behave as they did when the mouse was young simply by limiting its food for four weeks. The genetic rejuvenation won’t reverse other damage caused by time for the mouse, but could help its liver metabolize drugs or get rid of toxins.²
Spindler’s team fed three mice a normal diet for their whole lives, and fed another three on half-rations.³ Three more mice were switched from the normal diet to half-feed³ for a month when they were 34 months old --- equivalent to about 70 human years.
The researchers checked the activity of 11,000 genes from the mouse livers, and found that 46 changed with age in the normally fed mice. The changes were associated with things like inflammation and free radical production4--- probably bad news for mouse health. In the mice that had dieted all their lives, 27 of those 46 genes continued to behave like young genes. But the most surprising finding was that the mice that only started dieting in old age also benefited from 70 per cent of these gene changes.
“This is the first indication that these effects kick in5 pretty quickly,” says Huber Warner from the National Institute on Aging near Washington, D.C..
No one yet knows if calorie restriction works in people as it does in mice, but Spindler is hopeful. “There’s attracting and tempting evidence out there that it will work,” he says.
If it does work in people, there might be good reasons for rejuvenating the liver. As we get older, our bodies are less efficient at metabolizing drugs, for example. A brief period of time of dieting, says Spindler, could be enough to made sure a drug is effective.
But Spindler isn’t sure the trade-off is worth it6. “The mice get less disease, they live longer, but they’re hungry,” he says. “Even seeing what a diet does, it’s still hard to go to a restaurant and say: ‘I can only eat half of that’.”
Spindler hopes we soon won’t need to diet at all. His company, Life Span Genetics in California, is looking for drugs that have the effects of calorie restriction.
词汇：
meager adj. 不足的 youthful adj. 有青春活力的
vigor n. 精力，活力 metabolize vt. 使（一种物质）进入新陈代谢过程
rejuvenation n. 恢复活力，返老还童 liver n. 肝脏
toxin n. 毒素 ration n. 定量
inflammation n. 炎症，发炎 trade-off n. 交换，交易
rejuvenate vt. 使恢复活力，使回春
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