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  3. If American medicine were a patient, he would weigh 350 pounds and be gaining fast. Despite being repeatedly counseled about the

If American medicine were a patient, he would weigh 350 pounds and be gaining fast. Despite being repeatedly counseled about the

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问题    If American medicine were a patient, he would weigh 350 pounds and be gaining fast. Despite being repeatedly counseled about the dangers of morbid obesity, he would be making at best half-hearted attempts to mend his gluttonous (excessive drinking and eating) ways. Meanwhile, his doctors, insurance company, politicians and regulators would remain in a deep state of denial, clutching the illusion that their patient, other than being a bit overweight, was in tip-top health. Truth be told, the US medical system is headed for multiple organ failure.
   The spiraling cost of healthcare is well known: $7,100 per person this year, projected to increase to $12,000 in 2015 and compounding at more than double the rate of inflation. Already, medical care gobbles up one-sixth of the GDP. Even so, we ask ourselves, how better to spend our money on the best healthcare in the world? Not so fast. The facts show that these enormous expenditures may be buying us the best facilities in medical care—but not the best health.
   For example, Canada spends only 60% as much per person on healthcare as the United States. Yet, since 1980, the longevity of all Canadians has improved more rapidly than that of only white Americans. Yes, the "queues" in Canada can involve delays in nonemergency care. But these could be shortened with relatively small increases in funding. An article in the US journal Health Affairs investigating the number of Canadians who come here to avoid these waits found the number so small that it asked, "A tip with no iceberg?" Britain spends only 40% as much as we do on healthcare. But according to the Journal of the American Medical Assn., middle-class insured Americans "are much less healthy than their English counterparts".
   In fact, although Americans spend twice as much per person on healthcare as the other 21 wealthiest countries, data from the World Health Organization show that we live the shortest amount of time in good health—2 years less than the average in the other countries.
   Reviewing a Dartmouth Medical School study that found higher mortality rates in areas that spent the most on Medicare, professor Elliott Fisher concluded that "perhaps a third of medical spending is now devoted to services that don’t appear to improve health or the quality of care—and may make things worse." This means that the US is wasting more than $650 billion a year—half again more than the entire Defense Department will spend this year, including the cost of the war in Iraq—on unnecessary and often harmful.
"A tip with no iceberg?" (Para. 3) most probably means _____.
选项 A、patients in Canada sometimes do have to wait for nonemergency treatments
B、shortage of funds in Canadian medical system can be resolved easily
C、a big increase in funding is needed in Canada, not a small one
D、delays in nonemergency treatment in Canada are not such a serious problem
答案D
解析 语义理解题。第三段第三、四句讲到加拿大医疗制度的一个小问题，即排队会导致延误治疗，但因此选择到美国医院就诊的人仍然很少，也就是说，这个问题并不严重，D项的理解正确。
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