平時(shí)對(duì)于托福閱讀素材的積累，說不定會(huì)在考試時(shí)能夠運(yùn)用到，那么下面就和出國(guó)留學(xué)網(wǎng)的小編一起來看看托福閱讀素材：科學(xué)將打贏抗擊癌癥的技術(shù)戰(zhàn)。
Health care
Closing in on cancer
Science will win the technical battle against cancer. But that is only half the fight
醫(yī)療保健
圍攻癌癥
科學(xué)將打贏抗擊癌癥的技術(shù)戰(zhàn)。但那只是戰(zhàn)場(chǎng)的一半
THE numbers are stark. Cancer claimed the lives of 8.8m people in 2015； only heart disease caused more deaths. Around 40% of Americans will be told they have cancer during their lifetimes. It is now a bigger killer of Africans than malaria. But the statistics do not begin to capture the fear inspired by cancer’s silent and implacable cellular mutiny. Only Alzheimer’s exerts a similar grip on the imagination.數(shù)字是慘烈的。2015年癌癥奪走了880萬人的生命，只有因心臟病死亡的人數(shù)比這更高。約40%的美國(guó)人一生中會(huì)被告知罹患癌癥。對(duì)于非洲人來說，如今癌癥比瘧疾的殺傷力更大。但是統(tǒng)計(jì)數(shù)據(jù)遠(yuǎn)遠(yuǎn)不能體現(xiàn)癌癥帶來的恐懼——細(xì)胞變異悄無聲息地發(fā)生著，卻絕不留情。只有阿爾茨海默癥能如此抓住人的想像力。
Confronted with this sort of enemy， people understandably focus on the potential for scientific breakthroughs that will deliver a cure. Their hope is not misplaced. Cancer has become more and more survivable over recent decades owing to a host of advances， from genetic sequencing to targeted therapies. The five-year survival rate for leukemia in America has almost doubled， from 34% in the mid-1970s to 63% in 2006-12. America is home to about 15.5m cancer survivors， a number that will grow to 20m in the next ten years. Developing countries have made big gains， too： in parts of Central and South America， survival rates for prostate and breast cancer have jumped by as much as a fifth in only a decade.面對(duì)這樣的敵人，可以理解人們?yōu)楹稳绱岁P(guān)注科學(xué)取得突破、發(fā)現(xiàn)抗癌良方的可能性。他們的希望并沒落空。從基因測(cè)序到靶向治療，由于這些手段取得的進(jìn)展，近幾十年來癌癥患者的存活率越來越高。在美國(guó)，白血病的五年存活率從上世紀(jì)70年代中期的34%提高到2006年至2012年間的63%，幾乎翻了一番。美國(guó)有大約1550萬癌癥幸存者，今后十年這個(gè)數(shù)字將增至2000萬。發(fā)展中國(guó)家也取得了相當(dāng)大的進(jìn)步：在中南美洲部分地區(qū)，短短十年內(nèi)，前列腺癌和乳腺癌的存活率上升了五分之一。
From a purely technical perspective， it is reasonable to expect that science will one day turn most cancers into either chronic diseases or curable ones. But cancer is not fought only in the lab. It is also fought in doctors’ surgeries， in schools， in public-health systems and in government departments. The dispatches from these battlefields are much less encouraging.從純技術(shù)的角度看，我們有理由相信，有朝一日科學(xué)會(huì)將大多數(shù)癌癥轉(zhuǎn)化為慢性病或可治愈的病癥。但是抗擊癌癥的戰(zhàn)斗不僅僅是在實(shí)驗(yàn)室里展開，手術(shù)室、學(xué)校、公共衛(wèi)生系統(tǒng)還有政府部門也是戰(zhàn)場(chǎng)。從這些戰(zhàn)場(chǎng)傳來的訊息就遠(yuǎn)沒那么令人歡欣鼓舞了。
Cell-side research
First， the good news. Caught early， many cancers are now highly treatable. Three out of four British men who received a prostate-cancer diagnosis in the early 1970s did not live for another ten years； today four out of five do. Other cancers， such as those of the lung， pancreas and brain， are harder to find and treat. But as our Technology Quarterly shows， progress is being made. Techniques to enable early diagnosis include a device designed to detect cancer on the breath； blood tests can track fragments of DNA shed from tumours. Genome sequencing makes it ever easier to identify new drug targets.
實(shí)驗(yàn)室研究
先來看看好消息。如果發(fā)現(xiàn)得早，現(xiàn)在很多癌癥都可以得到很好的治療。上世紀(jì)70年代早期，被診斷為前列腺癌的英國(guó)患者中有四分之三活不過十年，而現(xiàn)在五分之四的患者可以再活十年。有些癌癥較難發(fā)現(xiàn)也較難治療，比如肺癌、胰腺癌和腦癌。但正如我們的《科技季刊》所報(bào)道的那樣，在這方面還是取得了一些進(jìn)展。有一項(xiàng)早期診斷技術(shù)是一種可通過呼吸來探測(cè)癌癥的設(shè)備；血液測(cè)試可以追蹤從腫瘤上脫落的DNA碎片。基因組測(cè)序也讓確定新藥標(biāo)靶變得愈加容易。
The established trio of 20th-century cancer treatments—surgery， radiation and chemotherapy—are all still improving. Radiotherapists can create webs of gamma rays， whose intersections deliver doses high enough to kill tumours but which do less damage to healthy tissue as they enter and leave the body. Some new drugs throttle the growth of blood vessels bringing nutrients to tumours； others attack cancer cells’ own DNA-repair kits. Cancer may be relentless； so too is science. 二十世紀(jì)的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)抗癌“三重奏”——手術(shù)、放療和化療——都還在不斷改進(jìn)。放射科醫(yī)師可以使用伽馬射線立體定向治療，其射線相交的輻射劑量足以殺死腫瘤，但當(dāng)射線穿越人體時(shí)對(duì)健康組織的損害較小。一些新藥能抑制為腫瘤輸送營(yíng)養(yǎng)物質(zhì)的血管生長(zhǎng)，還有一些新藥會(huì)攻擊癌細(xì)胞的DNA自我修復(fù)機(jī)制。癌癥或許殘酷無情，但科學(xué)也一樣。
The greatest excitement is reserved for immunotherapy， a new approach that has emerged in the past few years. The human immune system is equipped with a set of brakes that cancer cells are able to activate； the first immunotherapy treatment in effect disables the brakes， enabling white blood cells to attack the tumours. It is early days， but in a small subset of patients this mechanism has produced long-term remissions that are tantamount to cures. Well over 1，000 clinical trials of such treatments are under way， targeting a wide range of different cancers. It is even now possible to reprogram immune cells to fight cancer better by editing their genomes； the first such gene therapy was approved for use in America last month.最令人興奮的是前幾年出現(xiàn)的一種新療法：免疫療法。人類的免疫系統(tǒng)配有一套“剎車”機(jī)制，而癌細(xì)胞可以踩下這個(gè)“剎車”。首個(gè)免疫療法實(shí)際上是把“剎車”禁用了，好讓白細(xì)胞去攻擊腫瘤。該療法還處于初期階段，但在一小部分患者身上，它已經(jīng)產(chǎn)生了長(zhǎng)期的緩解作用，相當(dāng)于治愈。這類療法正在進(jìn)行的臨床試驗(yàn)遠(yuǎn)超過1000項(xiàng)，針對(duì)的癌癥多種多樣?，F(xiàn)在甚至可以通過編輯基因組對(duì)免疫細(xì)胞重新編程，使其更好地抗擊癌癥。上個(gè)月，首個(gè)這類基因療法在美國(guó)獲準(zhǔn)使用。
Yet cancer sufferers need not wait for the therapies of tomorrow to have a better chance of survival today. Across rich and poor countries， the survivability of cancer varies enormously. Men die at far higher rates than women in some countries； in other countries， at similar levels of development， they do comparably well. The five-year survival rate for a set of three common cancers in America and Canada is above 70%； Germany achieves 64%， whereas Britain manages a mere 52%. Disparities exist within countries， too. America does well in its treatment of cancer overall， but suffers extraordinary inequalities in outcomes. The death rate of black American men from all cancers is 24% higher than it is for white males； breast-cancer death rates among blacks are 42% higher than for whites. A diagnosis in rural America is deadlier than one in its cities.不過，癌癥患者不需要等待未來的療法來獲得更大的存活機(jī)會(huì)。不管是富裕國(guó)家還是貧窮國(guó)家，國(guó)與國(guó)之間癌癥患者的存活率差別很大。在有些國(guó)家，男性患者的死亡率遠(yuǎn)高于女性；而在發(fā)展水平相似的另一些國(guó)家，男女患者的死亡率并無很大差別。在美國(guó)和加拿大，三種常見癌癥的患者五年存活率高于70%，在德國(guó)達(dá)到64%，在英國(guó)僅為52%。國(guó)家內(nèi)部也存在差異。美國(guó)癌癥治療方面總體情況較好，但取得的效果非常不均衡。美國(guó)黑人男性罹患各種癌癥后的死亡率比美國(guó)白人男性高24%；黑人乳腺癌的死亡率比白人高42%；鄉(xiāng)村居民的癌癥死亡率高于城市居民。
Practical as well as pioneering
Variations between countries are partly a reflection of health-care spending： more than half of patients requiring radiotherapy in low- and middle-income countries do not have access to treatment. But big budgets do not guarantee good outcomes. Iceland and Portugal do not outspend England and Denmark on health care as a proportion of GDP， but past studies show wide variation in survivability in all cancers.
既實(shí)用又富開創(chuàng)性
國(guó)家之間的差異一定程度上反映了醫(yī)療保健支出的差別：在低收入和中等收入國(guó)家中，超過一半需要放療的患者沒有接受治療的機(jī)會(huì)。但是，巨額預(yù)算并不能保證良好的結(jié)果。冰島和葡萄牙的醫(yī)療保健支出占GDP的比例并不比英國(guó)和丹麥高，但過去的研究顯示，這些國(guó)家之間各種癌癥的存活率差別很大。
Instead， the problem is often how money is spent， not how much of it there is. To take one example， a vaccine exists against the human papillomavirus （HPV）， which causes cancers of the cervix in women， as well as cancers of the head and neck. Rwanda started a programme of routine vaccination in 2011， and aims to eradicate cervical cancer by 2020. Other countries are far less systematic. Vaccinations could help prevent cervical cancer in 120，000 Indian women each year.相反，問題往往在于錢是怎么花的，而不是花了多少錢。舉個(gè)例子，人乳頭瘤病毒（HPV）會(huì)導(dǎo)致婦女罹患宮頸癌，還會(huì)引發(fā)頭部和頸部的癌癥，現(xiàn)在就出現(xiàn)了一種針對(duì)該病毒的疫苗。2011年盧旺達(dá)啟動(dòng)了常規(guī)疫苗接種計(jì)劃，目標(biāo)是到2020年消滅宮頸癌。其他國(guó)家則遠(yuǎn)沒有這樣的系統(tǒng)性做法。接種疫苗每年可使12萬印度婦女免于患宮頸癌。
Policymakers are not powerless. More can be done to verify which treatments （and combinations thereof） work best. A ￡1.3bn （$2bn） cancer-drug fund in England， which made expensive new medicines easier to obtain， did not assess the efficacy of the drugs it provided—a huge missed opportunity. Measuring the incidence and survival of cancer， through cancer registries， spotlights where patients are being failed. Access to health care matters， too： the number of Americans whose cancers were diagnosed at the earliest possible opportunity went up after Obamacare was enacted. And prevention remains the best cure of all. Efforts to rein in tobacco use averted 22m deaths （many of them to cancer） between 2008 and 2014. Yet only a tenth of the world’s population lives in countries where taxes make up at least three-quarters of the price of cigarettes， as recommended by the World Health Organisation.政策制定者并非無能為力。他們可以做更多工作來驗(yàn)證哪種治療方法（及其組合）效果最好。在英國(guó)，一個(gè)13億英鎊（20億美元）的癌癥藥物基金讓人們更容易獲得昂貴的新藥，卻沒有評(píng)估所提供藥物的療效，這是一個(gè)巨大的錯(cuò)失的機(jī)會(huì)。通過癌癥病例登記來計(jì)算癌癥的發(fā)病率和存活率，可以找出治療在哪些環(huán)節(jié)上失敗了。能享受醫(yī)保也很重要：奧巴馬醫(yī)改實(shí)施后，及早診斷出癌癥的美國(guó)人數(shù)量上升了。而預(yù)防仍然是最好的解藥。2008年至2014年間，對(duì)煙草的控制讓2200萬人免于死亡（其中許多人可能會(huì)死于癌癥）。然而世界上只有十分之一的人口所在的國(guó)家征收的煙草稅占到香煙價(jià)格的四分之三——這是世界衛(wèi)生組織推薦的稅率。
Taxes and budgeting are a lot less exciting than tumour-zapping proton beams and antibodies with superpowers. But the decisions of technocrats are as important as the work of technicians. Cancer kills millions of people not simply for want of scientific advance， but also because of bad policy.比起消滅腫瘤的質(zhì)子束和擁有超能力的抗體，征稅和編預(yù)算要無趣得多。但技術(shù)官僚的決策和技術(shù)人員的工作一樣重要。癌癥奪走了數(shù)百萬人的生命不僅是因?yàn)槿狈茖W(xué)進(jìn)展，糟糕的政策也是原因。