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  3. It is said that in England death is pressing, in Canada inevitable and in California optional. Small wonder. Americans’ life exp

It is said that in England death is pressing, in Canada inevitable and in California optional. Small wonder. Americans’ life exp

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问题     It is said that in England death is pressing, in Canada inevitable and in California optional. Small wonder. Americans’ life expectancy has nearly doubled over the past century. Failing hips can be replaced, clinical depression controlled, cataracts removed in a 30-minute surgical procedure. Such advances offer the aging population a quality of life that was unimaginable when I entered medicine 50 years ago. But not even a great health-care system can cure death—and our failure to confront that reality now threatens this greatness of ours.
    Death is normal; we are genetically programmed to disintegrate and perish, even under ideal conditions. We all understand that at some level, yet as medical consumers we treat death as a problem to be solved. Shielded by third-party payers from the cost of our care we demand everything that can possibly be done for us, even if it’s useless. The most obvious example is late-stage cancer care. Physicians—frustrated by their inability to cure the disease and fearing loss of hope in the patient—too often offer aggressive treatment far beyond what is scientifically justified.
    In 1950, the U. S. spent $ 12. 7 billion on health care. In 2002, the cost will be $ 1,540 billion. Anyone can see this trend is unsustainable. Yet few seem willing to try to reverse it. Some scholars conclude that a government with finite resources should simply stop paying for medical care that sustains life beyond a certain age—say 83 or so. Former Colorado governor Richard Lamm has been quoted as saying that the old and infirm "have a duty to die and get out of the way" so that younger, healthier people can realize their potential.
    I would not go that far. Energetic people now routinely work through their 60s and beyond, and remain dazzlingly productive. At 78 Viacom chairman Sumner Redstone jokingly claims to be 53. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor is in her 70s, and former surgeon general C. Everett Koop chairs an Internet start-up in his 80s. These leaders are living proof that prevention works and that we can manage the health problems that come naturally with age. As a mere 68-year-old, I wish to age as productively as they have.
    Yet there are limits to what a society can spend in this pursuit. As a physician, I know the most costly and dramatic measures may be ineffective and painful. I also know that people in Japan and Sweden, countries that spend far less on medical care, have achieved longer, healthier lives than we have. As a nation we may be overfunding the quest for unlikely cures while under-funding research on humbler therapies that could improve people’s lives.
The author uses the example of cancer patients to show that______.
选项 A、medical resources are often wasted
B、doctors are helpless against fatal diseases
C、some treatment are too aggressive
D、medical costs are becoming unaffordable
答案A
解析 例证题。在第二段中，作者举出晚期癌症患者的例子，指出医生们因无力治好病而沮丧，又担心患者丧失希望，往往采取一些过激的、缺乏科学根据的治疗方法。光看这一句，似乎A、B、C选项都正确。但是，结合文章来看(这篇文章是为了说服人们勇敢地接受死亡这一自然规律)，我们发现它的作用是为了说明人们通常浪费了医疗资源，过度地投入在回天无力的事情上。从这道题中，我们可以学到，论据就是为了证明论点的，文章中的任何一句话都不能孤立地去理解，而应该结合文章大意，结合上下文去理解。所以A项是正确的。B、C项都没有答到点子上。文中并没有提及D项内容，所以是错误的。
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