The main cause of death and disability in the US

    Stroke (中风) is the main cause of death and disability in the United States. Every 45 seconds, someone in America has a stroke. {#blank#}1{#/blank#} It is the nation's third leading cause of death, ranking behind diseases of the heart and all forms of cancer. The following is something more about stroke.

Definition and description of a stroke

    Stroke is a type of cardiovascular disease. It affects the arteries(动脉) leading to and within the brain. A stroke occurs when a blood vessel（血管） that carries oxygen and nutrients to the brain is either blocked by a clot or bursts. {#blank#}2{#/blank#} So stroke forms.

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    The American Stroke Association has identified several factors (因素) that increase the risk of stroke. The more risk factors a person has, the greater the chance that he or she will have a stroke. Some of these you can't control, such as increasing age, family health history, race, and previous stroke. {#blank#}4{#/blank#} Factors resulting from lifestyle or environment can be improved with a healthcare provider's help.

Breakthroughs in treatment

    {#blank#}5{#/blank#} In fact, about 600,000 people have strokes every year. For many years, there was no hope for those suffering a stroke. However, recent breakthroughs have led to new treatments. For the treatments to work, the person must get to a hospital immediately.

    A few years ago, a company called Space Marketing came up with a plan to send a mile–long advertisement into space. To advertising agencies (机构), it would have been “a dream come true”. However, advertising standards agencies finally decided not to allow Space Marketing to go ahead with their plans and they were forced to give them up.

    Space may indeed be the final place for advertisers, because on Earth we are already surrounded by advertising wherever we are and whatever we are doing. Apart from the obvious adverts that we see every day on TV, and in newspapers and magazines, there is a whole 'other world' of advertising messages for our attention. There are ads that we see on the side of the bus we catch to work, for example. And what about the logos (商标) we see on the clothing of the people we walk past in the streets?

    Most of the time, we are probably not even aware of (意识到的) these less obvious advertising methods, but that doesn't mean that they don't work. Take 'product placement', for example. You are in a cinema, watching the latest Hollywood movie. Look carefully at the make of car your favorite actor is driving. And what about his watch? Can you see what brand it is? Chances are, you can, and the company that owns the brand is likely to have paid thousands for it to appear in the film.

    So, whether Space Marketing finally succeeds in sending ads into space or not is perhaps less important than it might seem. This would not change a thing. Our everyday lives are already strongly influenced by advertising whether we realize it or not.

    When the dog named Judy spotted the first sheep in her life, she did what comes naturally. The four-year-old dog set off racing after the sheep across several fields and, being a city animal, lost both her sheep and her sense of direction. Then she ran along the edge of cliff( 悬崖) and fell 100 feet, bouncing off a rock into the sea.

    Her owner Mike Holden panicked and celled the coastguard of Cornwall, who turned up in seconds. Six volunteers slid down the cliff with the help of a rope but gave up all hope of finding her alive after a 90-minute search.

    Three days later, a hurricane hit the coast near Cornwall. Mr. Holden returned home from his holiday upset and convinced his pet was dead. He comforted himself with the thought she had died in the most beautiful part of the country.

    For the next two weeks, the Holdens were heartbroken. Then, one day, the phone rang and Steve Tregear, the coastguard of Cornwall, asked Holder if he would like his dog bark.

    A birdwatcher, armed with a telescope, found the pet sitting desperately on a rock. While he sounded the alarm, a student from Leeds climbed down the cliff to collect Judy.

    The dog had initially been knocked unconscious(失去知觉的)but had survived by drinking water from a fresh scream at the base of the cliff. She may have fed on the body of a sheep which had also fallen over the edge. “The dog was very thin and hungry,” Steve Tregear said, “It was a very dog. She survived because of a plentiful supply of fresh water,” he added.

    It was, as Mr. Holden admitted, “a minor miracle(奇迹)”.

    To above prices, please add $3 for first book and $1 for each additional book for postage & handling. Foreign countries add $5 per book. Send orders to Quackwatch, P. O. Box 1747, Allen Avenue, NY 18105. The checks must be in US dollars. We cannot process credit card orders. Please use our order form from Amazon.com and include your email address.

    When we talk about famous UK writer Agatha Christie, it seems that her famous detectives Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple are must-reads. So, of course, are her best-selling novels Murder on the Orient Express (1934) and Death on the Nile (1937).

But when the readers around the world were asked to name their favorite Christie novel to mark her 125th birthday on Sept 15, And Then There Were None (1939) topped the list, reported The Guardian.

    It may surprise you to learn that it is a crime novel without a detective. What it does have is suspense (n.悬念) and a very sinister (adj.邪恶的) atmosphere. It is “on a knife edge”, as Mathew Prichard, Christie's grandson, told the newspaper.

    Ten people get an invitation to come to a house on a small island near Devon in South West England. Nobody refuses these invitations since each one promises something the person wants: a job, a holiday, a chance to meet up again with an old friend.

    These people are all responsible for deaths. Some are directly responsible, others are responsible because of what they did not do. Anthony James Marston, for instance, killed two children while driving dangerously. He did not feel guilty and actually complained when he was banned from driving. Another, Emily Caroline Brent, is a harsh person who threw out a young servant for becoming pregnant while unmarried. The servant later killed herself.

    When they arrive at the house they are played a recording. The voice gives details of the wrongdoing of each of the guests. Starting with Marston, each is killed in a way that fits their crime. The series of deaths is completed with a hanging, “and then there were none”, as the title suggests.

    Christie can be quite a predictable writer. Some of her stories are a little unoriginal. But this book is full of clever writing. Look it up to find out what this hugely successful mystery writer, the “Queen of Crime” as she was called, could do at her best.

    Trees are useful to man in three very important ways: they provide him wood and other products; they give him shade; and they help to prevent drought (干旱) and floods.

    Unfortunately, in many parts of the world, man has not realized that the third of these services is the most important. In his eagerness to draw quick profit from the trees, he has cut them down in large numbers.

    Two thousand years ago, a rich and powerful country cut down its trees to build warships, with which to gain itself an empire. It gained the empire but, without its trees, its soil became bare and poor. When the empire fell to pieces, the country found itself faced by floods and starvation.

    Even where a government realizes the importance of a plentiful supply of trees, it is difficult sometimes to make the people realize this. They cut down the trees but are too careless to plant and look after new trees. So unless the government has a good system of control, or can educate the people, the forests slowly disappear.

    This does not only mean that there will be fewer trees. The results are even more serious: for where there are trees, their roots break the soil up, allowing the rain to sink in, and also bind the soil. This prevents the soil from being washed away. But where there are no trees, the rainfalls on hard ground and flows away on the surface, and this causes floods and the rain carries away the rich top soil in which crops grow. When all the top soil is gone, nothing remains but worthless desert.