Accidents and illness are unhappy things to talk about, but no one can expect to live a lifetime without having some kind of accident or becoming ill. Some accidents and illnesses are serious and may result in long periods of invalidism.
The newspapers contain spectacular accounts of accidents in the street and highways and public places, but nearly as many accidents occur around the home. Somebody trips on a rug. Somebody falls off a stepladder. Somebody is careless in cooking dinner, and is burned. Accidents incurred in the playing of sports and swimming also accounts for a large number of injuries, big and little. Despite constant campaigns to reduce the number of accidents, there are still approximately 100,000 accidental deaths and nearly 9,000,000 nonfatal injuries in the United States each year.
It has been estimated that around 3,000,000 people are constantly ill in the United States throughout the year and that over half the illness is caused by respiratory diseases, chiefly colds and influenza.
The pain and suffering caused by accidents and illness tell only half the story. Loss of time from school and work and medical and hospital expenses often make the pain seem worse. Money spent in this country for doctors, services, hospitalization, nursing care, drugs, medicines, Xrays, and special treatments, amounts to a huge annual sum. Added to this expense is another much larger amount that is lost to wage earners throughout the nation by reason of their loss of wages or income while sick or otherwise disabled.
Accident and health insurance is a form of insurance devised to protect against these economic losses. It protects the earning of wage earners and finishes financial aid to the family of the breadwinner by the payment of his doctor and hospital bills. Today, business and professional men, farmers, industrial workers, clerks and those engaged in various occupations, whose earning power is shut off for a week, a month, or sometimes years, because of accidents or illness can insure themselves against this financial loss by accident and health insurance.
Protection is available to all types of workers and the cost(called the premium)ranges from a few cents a day for small or limited policies to a month for policies paying larger amounts(called indemnities). Policy is another name for an insurance contract(合同). Most accident and health policies are cancelable policies—that is, they are sold for a definite term such as a week, a month, or a year, similar to contracts of fire insurance and automobile liability insurance. There are, however, policies which cannot be canceled or terminated(終止)by the insurance company until the policyholder reaches an age at which he usually has no further earning power—most often at sixty or sixtyfive years. These noncancelable policies cost more than the cancelable policies.
小題1:What is the passage mainly concerned about?
| A．Everyone will have some sort of illness or accident. |
| B．Accident and health insurance is available to everyone. |
| C．Cancelable insurance policies are better than noncancelable one. |
| D．Insurance is a good protection against accidents and illness. |
小題2:Every year in the United States there are________.
| A．more people die in accidents than of illness |
| B．more people who are ill than those injured in accidents |
| C．more outdoor accidents than indoor accidents |
| D．more people injured in accidents than those who are constantly ill |
小題3:The heaviest pain and suffering caused by accidents and illness are________.
| A．colds and influenza | B．financial losses |
| C．loss of time | D．invalidism |
小題4:Accident and health insurance will protect people by________.
| A．covering their medical expenditure |
| B．paying their wages |
| C．restoring their earning power |
| D．providing policyholders with the money they need to survive |
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