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  3. Bangladeshi communities that are already being poisoned by arsenic-tainted(含砷)groundwater are facing an appalling new threat. Th

Bangladeshi communities that are already being poisoned by arsenic-tainted(含砷)groundwater are facing an appalling new threat. Th

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问题     Bangladeshi communities that are already being poisoned by arsenic-tainted(含砷)groundwater are facing an appalling new threat. Their rice and vegetables are also laced with high levels of arsenic.
    The health effects of eating such tainted food are not yet known, but the ramifications(门类)could be enormous. The WHO says contaminated drinking water alone could kill 270,080 Bangladeshis over the next decade.
    In a terrible irony, arsenic entered the Bangladeshi water supply when UNICEF and other international agencies sank millions of tube veils to provide clean drinking water. But the wells tapped into groundwater contaminated by arsenic from sedimentary deposits deep below Bangladesh. To deal with the problem, UNICEF and the World Bank have been testing water from wells and marking them safe or dangerous—but that testing program has been found to be flawed.
    To make matters worse, water from the wells is also used to irrigate paddy(水稻)fields. However, until now it wasn’t known whether or not the rice was accumulating-arsenic. Tests on rice samples from around Bangladesh had found that arsenic levels did indeed vary according to the strength of local arsenic contamination in the soil and groundwater.
    Arsenic levels in different varieties of rice ranged from about 0.05 to 1.8 parts per million. In Europe and the US, levels are around 0.05 parts per million. The WHO recommends a maximum level of 0.01 parts per million in drinking water—but therefore, no guidelines for levels in foods.
    Ravi Naidu at CSIRO in Adelaide and his colleagues have been studying the uptake of arsenic from the soil by Bangladeshi crops.
    Their data shows that arum, a popular vegetable, has arsenic levels of nearly 150 parts per million. It is usually grown in wet zones adjacent to the tube wells. But some vegetables such as spinach and beans are relatively free from arsenic. The rice grains studied by Naidu’s team had arsenic levels that ranged from undetectable to over 1.6 parts per million. Their calculations show that nearly 30 per cent of the total arsenic intake for people in Bangladesh may be coming from their food.
    If the body can absorb arsenic from food—and this is yet to be proven—then merely tackling drinking water contamination will not be enough. Researchers fear that paddy fields will continue to be irrigated from poisoned tube wells because Bangladesh does not have enough arsenic-free water for agriculture.
Which of the following is NOT true according to the passage?
选项 A、Water accounts for 70% of the arsenic intake for the Bangladeshis.
B、Researchers doubt that the body can absorb arsenic from food.
C、People in Bangladesh will soon be free of arsenic intake.
D、Crops in Bangladesh will continue to be irrigated from poisoned tube wells.
答案C
解析 根据文章内容可知，孟加拉国民众吸入的砷元素中近30％可能来自于食物，换言之，70％的砷元素来自于饮水，故排除A项。文中说身体是否可以从食物中吸入砷元素这一点还有待于证明，故排除B项。文中说研究人员担心稻田灌溉将继续使用受过污染的管井，因为孟加拉国没有足够的无砷水用于农业，故排除D项。纵观全文，砷污染的问题在孟加拉国很严重，不会很快得到解决的，故C项不能从文中得出。据此判断，答案是C。
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