Humanity"s greatest accomplishment of the past five decades, declared Bill Gates this week, is the reduction in the number of deaths among young children by half, to 10 million a year in 2007. The world"s most successful capitalist heaped praise on the World Health Organization(WHO), while unveiling an ambitious new global scheme to eliminate polio within a few years. For his part, the agency"s top polio man, Bruce Aylward, described the fight against the disease in the language of markets: "Elimination is the venture capital of public health: the risks are huge but so too are the rewards." The use of this sort of language captures a change in public health in the past decade. The Gates Foundation, with its pots of money and businesslike approach, has transformed the bureaucratic and disheartened world of public health. It has helped revive ailing campaigns, including the fight against polio. This will now get a fresh $600m-plus, from British and German taxpayers, from the Rotary Club International, as well as from the Gates Foundation($255m). The decline from 350,000 new cases in 1988(when the goal of rapid polio eradication was first declared)to 2,000 cases now(chiefly in Nigeria, India, Pakistan and Afghanistan)looks like a near victory. But the final stretch is the hardest. Only one in 200 cases is readily vulnerable to early detection(as opposed to most victims of smallpox—a serious infectious disease that causes spots which leave deep marks on the skin, already eliminated). Polio is also far more infectious. Other obstacles are that the usual vaccine has not worked well in densely populated, disease-ridden central India. Researchers are now trying to find a vaccine that fits those conditions better. Neal Halsey, of Johns Hopkins University, says the "live" vaccines used commonly today must be backed up with further doses of "inactivated" vaccines. These need to become cheaper. The fighting in Afghanistan and Pakistan has hampered vaccination programs there. So have rumors among Muslims in northern Nigeria that the vaccination program was in fact a conspiracy to sterilize children. That allowed the polio virus to strengthen and spread. The Nigerian strain may have now reached a dozen other countries. The final push towards elimination will certainly be costly, though several recent studies suggest that it is cheaper to spend money on a big elimination effort now than to pay the price later for sustained vigilance and health costs. The prospect of a global revival is concentrating minds. That is why, despite the daunting challenges and potential donor fatigue, the world may end up making a go of elimination this time.
单选题 According to Paragraph 2, a change in the world of public health refers to the fact that public health
【正确答案】 C
【答案解析】解析：推理判断题。根据题干定位到第二段。可以发现change与原文“改变了(transform)公众健康领域的官僚作风和死气沉沉的局面”对应，C项符合此意。
单选题 It can be inferred from the third paragraph that eradication of polio is the hardest in that
【正确答案】 B
【答案解析】解析：事实细节题，考查因果细节。根据题干和hardest定位到第三段。其中说到“最后阶段最艰难，每200例中只有一例可以在早期查出。小儿麻痹症传染性也强得多。”，B项与之完全相符。
单选题 Muslims in northern Nigeria is cited as an example to show that
【正确答案】 B
【答案解析】解析：事实细节题，考查例证细节。根据Muslims in northern Nigeria定位到第五段。可以发现文中第四、五段讲述的都是疫苗接种(vaccine)在各国遇到的阻碍(obstacles)，因此B项符合文意。
单选题 By saying "the world may end up making a go of elimination this time"(Lines 4-5, Paragraph 6), the author implies that the world may
【正确答案】 A
【答案解析】解析：语义理解题。根据题干在第六段找到该句，可以发现该句原意为“全世界仍可能最终成功根除小儿麻痹症”。A项中manage to与原句make a go of意义相同，即“成功地做某事”。
单选题 Which of the following would be the best title of the text?
【正确答案】 D
【答案解析】解析：主旨大意题。本文主要讲述了世界在致力于根除小儿麻痹症的过程中取得的成绩(The decline from350，000 new cases in 1988 to 2,000 cases now)和遇到的阻碍(But the final stretch is the hardest．)，D项so near与so far与之相符。