Dr. Thomas Starzl, like all the pioneers of organ transplant, had tO live with failure.When he performed the world's first liver transplant 25 years ago, the patient, a three-year-old boy, died on the operating table. The next four patients did not live long enough to get out of the hospital. But more determined, than discouraged, Starzl and his colleagues went back to their lab at the University of Colorado Medical School. They devised(發(fā)明)techniques to reduce the heavy bleeding during surgery, and they worked on better ways to prevent the recipient' s immune system(免疫系統(tǒng)) from rejecting the organ- an ever-present risk. Now, thanks to further refinements, about two thirds of all liver-transplant patients are living more than a year.
　　But the triumphs of the transplant surgeons have created another tragic problem: a severe shortage of donor organs. "More and more people go on the waiting lists and there is wide disparity(差異)between supply and need," says one doctor. The American Council on Transplantation estimates that on any given day 15,000 Americans are waiting for or-gans. There is no shortage of actual organs; each year about 25,000 healthy people die un-expectedly in the United States, usually in accidents. The problem is that fewer than 20% become donors.
　　This trend persists despite laws designed to encourage organ recycling. Under the federal Anatomical Gift Act, a person can authorize the use of his organs after death by signing a statement. Legally, the next of kin can veto(否決)these posthumous(死后的)gifts, but surveys indicate that 70% to 80% of the public would not interfere with a family member's decision. The bigger roadblock, according to some experts, is that physicians do not ask for donations, either because they fear offending grieving survivors or because they still regard some transplant procedures as experimental.
　　When there are not enough organs to go around, distributing the available ones be-comes a matter of deciding who will live and who will die. Once donors and potential recip-ients have been matched for body size and blood type, the sickest patients customarily go to the top of the local waiting list. Besides the seriousness of the patient's condition, doc-tors base their choice on such criteria as the length of time the patient has been waiting and how long it will take to obtain an organ.
　　31. Which of the following statements is true according to the passage?
　　A. All the patients whom Dr. Starzl operated on died on the operating table.
　　B. To Dr. Starzl, it was very discouraging that his first liver transplant operation failed.
　　C. Many doctors had performed liver transplant before Starzl,
　　D. Dr. Starzl did not give up though he had failed in his attempts.
　　32. One frequent danger in organ transplantation is__________
　　A. heavy bleeding during surgery.
　　B. destruction of patients' immune system.
　　C. patients' objection of taking organs from others.
　　D. doctors' lack of confidence.
　　33. Nowadays two thirds of all liver-transplant can live__________
　　A. not long enough to get out the hospital.
　　B. about one year.
　　C. at least one year.
　　D. less than one year.
　　34. There would.be many more organ donors if__________
　　A. laws are designed to encourage organ recycling.
　　B. people cannot legally prevent a family member from donating his organ.
　　C. doctors are more willing to ask for donations.
　　D. transplant surgery is more successful.
　　35. Which of the following would be the best title for this passage?
　　A. Dr. Starzl and Transplant Surgeons
　　B. Transplant Surgery in the US
　　C. The Future of Transplant Surgery
　　D. Transplant Surgery and Shortage of Organs
　　參考譯文
　　跟所有進行器官移植手術的先驅一樣，Thomas Starzl醫(yī)生不得不承受失敗。25年前，當他進行世界上第一例肝臟移植手術時，接受手術的三歲小患者死在了手術臺上。接下來的四名接受器官移植的患者也未能活著走出醫(yī)院。但是，Starzl和他的同事并沒有氣餒，們的決心反而更加堅定了，他們又回到了科羅拉多大學醫(yī)學院的實驗室里進行鉆研。他們發(fā)明了一些技術用于減少病人在手術中的出血量，并且研究出更好的方法來防止病人的免疫系統(tǒng)對植入器官的排斥——是手術中經常會出現(xiàn)的危險。如今，因為有了這些進一步的改進，在所有的接受肝臟移植手術的患者中，有2／3的人能活過一年。
　　但是，外科醫(yī)生在器官移植手術上取得的成功引起了另外一個悲劇性問題：捐贈器官的嚴重缺乏。有醫(yī)生曾表示：“越來越多的人在等待接受手術，而器官的供求差異懸殊。美國的器官移植委員會估計，大約每天有1.5萬名美國人在等待著器官以進行移植手術。事實上缺的不是器官；每年美國大約有2.5萬名健康人死于非命，一般都是因事故死亡。而問題在于，這些人中，只有不到20%的人會成為器官捐贈者。
　　即使人們制定了法律來鼓勵器官的重新利用，現(xiàn)有的事態(tài)還在繼續(xù)。根據《聯(lián)邦解剖捐贈法案》的規(guī)定，通過簽署一項聲明，一個人可以指定其死后器官的用途。從法律角度來說，該死者的近親可以否決這種遺贈，但是有調查顯示，70%到80%的人不會干涉他們家庭中某一成員的決定。實際上，一些專家發(fā)現(xiàn)，最大的問題是由于外科醫(yī)生擔心會惹怒那些沉浸在悲痛中的家屬，或者是因為他們仍然認為器官移植處于試驗階段，所以他們一般不會主動提出讓死者捐出器官。
　　當器官資源不足時，如何分配那些可利用的器官就成了一件決定生死的事情。一旦有器官接受者在體型和血型方面與捐贈者相匹配時，這些器官接受者中病情最嚴重的就自動成為候選名單中的首選之人。除此之外，醫(yī)生在做決定讓誰接受器官移植時，除了要考慮患者的病情的輕重，還要考慮患者等待時間的長短、多久能獲得合適的器官。