2018医学考博英语阅读理解文章精析：最为致命的疾病

2018医学考博英语阅读理解文章精析：最为致命的疾病

　　2018医学考博英语第四部分阅读理解，此类题目是测试考生通过阅读英文书刊获取信息的能力(包括阅读速度和理解程度)，下面新东方在线考博频道从网络搜集整理了一系列医学考博英语阅读理解文章进行精析，希望对大家提高医学考博英语阅读能力有所帮助。

　　导 读：

　　西班牙型流行性感冒是人类历史上最致命的传染病，在 1918~1919 年曾经造成全世界约 10 亿人感染，2 千 5 百万到 4 千万人死亡(当时世界人口约 17 亿)。其名字的由来并不是因为该病从西班牙爆发，而是因为当时西班牙有约 8百万人感染了此病，甚至连西班牙国王也未能幸免，所以才被称之为西班牙流感。

　　100m dead

　　亿万亡灵

　　The deadliest disease in history

　　历史上最为致命的疾病

　　A new book looks at the global impact of the Spanish Flu

　　有本新书聚焦西班牙流感对全球的影响

　　May 25th 2017

　　Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How it Changed the World. By Laura Spinney. Jonathan Cape; 282 pages; £20. To be published in America by PublicAffairs in September; $28.

　　《死亡骑士：1918 年西班牙流感及其对世界的改变》。劳拉·斯宾尼 著，乔纳森海角出版社;282 页;20 英镑。将于 9 月份由 PublicAffairs 在美国出版发行;定价 28 美元。

　　BY EARLY 1920, nearly two years after the end of the first world war and the first outbreak of Spanish flu, the disease had killed as many as 100m people— more than both world wars combined. Yet few would name it as the biggest disaster of the 20th century. Some call it the “forgotten flu”. Almost a century on, “Pale Rider”, a scientific and historic account of Spanish flu, addresses this collective amnesia.

　　1920 年是第一次世界大战结束后的第二年，也是西班牙流感第一次爆发的第二年，截止至当年年初，已有多达一亿人死于这场瘟疫——比两次世界大战加起来的死亡人数都多。然而，鲜有人将它称为 20 世纪最大的灾难。一些人把它称为 “被遗忘的流感”。大约一个世纪后，《死亡骑士》面对这次集体失忆症，对西班牙流感进行了科学的、具有历史性的描述。

　　outbreak n. 爆发

　　amnesia n. 失忆

　　Influenza, like all viruses, is a parasite. Laura Spinney traces its long shadow over human history; records are patchy and uncertain, but Hippocrates’s “Cough of Perinthus” in 412 BC may be its first written description. Influenza-shaped footprints can be traced down the centuries: the epidemic that struck during Rome’s siege of Syracuse in 212 BC; the febrisitalica that plagued Charlemagne’s troops in the ninth century. The word “influenza” started being used towards the end of the Middle Ages from the Italian for “influence”—the influence of the stars. That was the state of knowledge then; in some ways at the start of the 20th century it was little better.

　　流感病毒和其他所有病毒一样，是寄生物。劳拉·斯宾尼追溯了流感在人类历史上的记录，纪录残缺不全，并且不确切。但是公元前 412 年希波克拉底的《佩琳托斯之咳嗽》可能是世界上第一部记载流感症状的著作。流感可以追溯到几个世纪后：在公元前 212 年罗马围攻锡拉库扎时，流感就曾经传播过。在九世纪，查理曼大帝的军队很多人都患上了流感。“流感” 这个词在中世纪末开始使用，来自于意大利语 “influence”，意思是星辰的影响。那是当时人们的理解。在某些方面，20 世纪初的人们对流感的了解也几乎不过如此。

　　parasite n. 寄生物

　　epidemic n. 传染病，流行病

　　febris n. 发热，发烧

　　Ms Spinney, an occasional contributor to The Economist, recreates the world that Spanish flu came into. At the beginning of the 20th century science was on the rise. Scientists had switched miasma theory of disease for germ theory: they understood that many diseases were caused not by “bad airs”, but by microscopic organisms like bacteria. This led to improvements in hygiene and sanitation, as well as the development of vaccines. But viruses were almost unknown. The magnification of optical microscopes was too weak to show them up. People could spot bacteria, but not viruses, which are smaller than the wavelength of visible light. Until the electron microscope was invented in the 1930s, influenza was, like the Higgs boson before 2012, a theoretical entity: its existence was deduced from its effects. In the face of such uncertainty, public faith in medicine wavered. People reverted tosuperstition: sugar lumps soaked in kerosene, and aromatic fires to clear “miasmas”.

　　斯宾尼偶尔给《经济学人》撰稿，她重现了西班牙流感爆发前的世界。在 20 世纪初科学正处于上升发展阶段。科学家们已经将疾病发生的原因从瘴气转向细菌：他们明白了许多疾病并不是因为“不良空气”而是由细菌等微生物导致。这种转变使得环境卫生条件有所改善，也促进了疫苗的研发。但是当时人们对于病毒几乎毫无了解。当时的光学显微镜的放大率太低以至于无法看到病毒。当时人们可以观测到细菌但看不到病毒，因为病毒比可见光波长还要小。直到 1930 年代电子显微镜被研发出来之前，流感病毒只是一个理论上存在的实体，就像是 2012 年前的希格斯玻色子一样：其存在可由其产生的影响推断出来。面对如此的不确定性，公众对于医学的信心动摇了。人们重新选择迷信：将糖块浸在煤油中，焚烧出香气来驱散 “瘴气”。

　　contributor n. 捐款人，捐助人;促成因素;投稿者;撰稿者

　　miasma n. 瘴气，臭气，不良影响

　　microscopic n. 显微镜的，用显微镜可看见，微小的，细微的

　　vaccines n. 疫苗，豆苗;豆苗的，疫苗的

　　magnifications n. 放大，夸大;放大率

　　electron microscope n. 电子显微镜

　　Higgs boson 希格斯玻色子

　　superstition n. 迷信

　　kerosene n. 煤油，火油

　　aromatic adj. 香气的，芬芳的，有香味的

　　Even so, Spanish flu was exceptionally deadly—about 25 times more so than seasonal flu. No one fully understands why. Ms Spinney ties the virulence of Spanish flu to its genetic irregularities and does a good job of explaining containment strategies through epidemiology. She draws on contemporary research, too, including the recent controversy about recreating the strain responsible for thepandemic. Ms Spinney is sanguine about the risks of such experiments: influenza appears to have all the ingredients for another catastrophic pandemic and scientists, using caution, should probably do all they can to learn more about it.

　　即便如此，西班牙流感的致命性高得异乎寻常——它的致死率比季节性流感要高上约 25 倍。没有人可以完全搞清楚原因。斯宾尼女士将西班牙流感的致命性解释为它的不规律遗传，并在从流行病学角度解释遏制策略方面颇有建树。(划线的句子期待你的翻译，欢迎大家积极留言) 对于这种实验的风险斯宾尼女士还是非常乐观的：流感病毒完全有可能卷土重来，带来另一场毁灭性的流行性疾病，所以科学家们在小心谨慎的情况下，或许应该尽可能地对这种病毒更加深入了解。

　　exceptionally adv. 异常的，特殊的

　　virulence n. 毒力，毒性

　　epidemiology n. 流行病学

　　pandemic adj. 全国流行的，普遍的;n. 瘟疫，流行性疾病

　　Perhaps the most valuable aspect of this book, though, is itsglobal perspective, tracing the course of the disease in Brazil, India, South Africa and Australia, among other places. In Europe and North America the first world war killed more than Spanish flu; everywhere else the reverse is true. Yet most narratives focus on the West, and only partly because that is where the best records are. Ms Spinney’s book goes some way to redress the balance.

　　但是或许这本书最有价值的地方是它的全球视角，在巴西、印度、南非、澳大利亚等地追踪流感的情形。在欧洲和北美洲，死于第一次世界大战的人比死于西班牙流感的要多，而在其他地方情况却正好相反。然而大部分的历史书把目光集中在西方，其部分原因是那里有最高纪录。斯宾尼女士的书在一定程度上纠正了这种偏颇。

　　global perspective 全球视角

　　reverse adj. 相反的

　　redress the balance 做公平处理

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