强化英语阅读3

强化英语阅读3

AIDS in South Africa is threatening to become a problem or a scale rivaling that in Uganda, according to data just released. At the end of 1993, 4.25 percent of South African adults were HIV positive. By the end of last year, the figure was 7.57 percent.

This 70 percent increase in a year is the largest for the spread of the virus in Africa and possibly the world, and it seems certain that 12 percent or more of the population will be HIV positive by Christmas.

There is no doubt that both the present and preceding government bear responsibility; each was aware of the crisis and did almost nothing. There is no public campaign to promote safe sex, for example. The apartheid regime was too conscious of religious sensitivities to organize an explicit anti-AIDS campaign, and the African National Congress, which leads the government, is far too nervous about traditional African attitudes to sex.

Many African men have responded to the epidemic by choosing younger and younger partners. There is even a myth that sex with young enough girl can cure an AIDS-stricken. Inevitably this means that young women are the hardest hit, a phenomenon compounded by the high incidence of rape.

Despite the spread of the virus, the statistics manage to struggle on to only about page six of most South African newspapers because the crisis is still in its “phoney war” stage-although there are more than 1.8 million HIV-positive South Africans, relatively few of them have developed AIDS. Doctor say the virus seems to be taking longer to move through its cycle here, perhaps because South Africans with their higher standards of living, are healthier and therefore more resistant than people further north in Africa.

No one is betting, however, that the help will be long. Without doubt, the present air of content will vanish as soon as the members of the elite begin to be affected and the implications for the economy sink in. Moreover, the spread of the virus may greatly damage the present racial reconciliation in South Africa, since AIDS is now overwhelmingly a disease of blacks, and many whites are beginning to see almost every African as an AIDS risk.

1. How is the rate of HIV infection in South Africa growing?

A. 4.25%

B. 7.57%

C. 12%

D. 70%

2. Who should be responsible for the quick spread of HIV in South Africa?

A. the government

B. Many African men

C. the young women

D. the HIV positive

3. Which one of the following is not the reason for the spread of HIV in Africa?

A. the traditional Africa attitude to sex is cautious

B. the government never dare launch the anti-AIDS campaign.

C. AIDS is related to some religious problems

D. African men choose the inappropriate partner

4. Why are black women the hardest hit in infecting the virus?

A. because the incidence of rape is quite high

B. because young girls can cure AIDS-stricken men.

C. because men believe women won’t have the virus

D. because men believe they can cure AIDS by intercourse with women.

5. What does “phoney war stage” in Para.5 mean?

A. the period of AIDS burst

B. the period of AIDS

C. the epidemic of AIDS is not too serious

D. the stage of fighting with AIDS.