英语听力文摘 English Digest 341、胶带能治病？

Duct Tape and Warts
管状胶带和疣

Have you ever used duct tape to tape a duct? Do you even know what a duct is? Maybe not. But you definitely know what duct tape is, and you’ve probably used it to fix everything from glasses to flashlights. Now, thanks to one study, we can officially add to the already long list of things to do with duct tape: curing warts. That’s right, duct tape might be used to cure warts.

The study tested duct tape against cryotherapy, which uses liquid nitrogen to freeze warts. Of a test group of fifty-one wart patients, roughly half received cryotherapy, the other half duct tape. The duct tape patients wore pieces of tape over their warts for six days and then removed it for twelve hours.

After soaking the wart in water and gently scrubbing it with pumice stone, the procedure was repeated for up to two months, or until the wart disappeared. The cryotherapy patients received a maximum of six treatments over the same time period. By the end, 85% of duct tape patients saw their warts vanish completely, while only 65% of cryotherapy recipients had similar results.

As for precisely¹ what makes duct tape so effective, researchers are still uncertain. Scientists speculate that by mildly irritating the wart, the tape activates² the immune system which suppresses the viral microbes that cause warts. Robbed of its microbes, the wart gradually vanishes.

Although duct tape has gotten all the publicity, it may be the case that other kinds of tape would do just as well. In any case, the next time you get a wart, talk to your medical professional about duct tape.

你曾经用管状胶带粘过管道吗？你知道管道是什么吗？也许你不知道。但你一定知道胶带，并且你可能用它来固定任何东西，比如眼镜或手电筒。现在，多亏了一项研究，我们可以正式在胶带能做的事情单上增加一件事：治疗疣。是的，胶带可用于治疗疣。

该项研究对胶带治疗疣和通过液态氮冷冻治疗疣进行了对照测试。测试组有五十一名病人，大约一半的病人接受了冷冻疗法，另一半病人接受管状胶带治疗。管状胶带疗法病人在长疣的地方贴上胶带，贴6天后再取下。

在水中浸泡疣后，用浮石轻轻擦拭其表面，这样坚持2个月，或直到疣消失。冷冻疗法的病人在同样时间内接受了6次疗法。在治疗结束时，管状胶带治疗组中占85%的病人寻常疣完全消退；而冷冻疗法治疗组中只有65%的病人寻常疣完全消退。

到底是什么使得管状胶带如此有效，研究人员目前还不能确定。科学家们推测也许是由于轻度地刺激疣，胶带激活了免疫系统，抑制了产生疣的病毒微生物的产生。微生没有了，疣就渐渐消失了。

尽管管状胶带已经被广泛宣传，但可能另外一种胶带也同样有效。不管怎样，以后如果长了疣，与你的专业医师谈谈管状胶带吧。

注释：
疣是人类乳头瘤病毒（HPV）所引起，以往认为这些疾病是慢性良性疾病，但发现HPV感染后有一部分会导致恶性肿瘤，如皮肤癌、舌癌和宫颈癌等，因而引起人们的重视。疣是病毒引起的以细胞增生反应为主的一类皮肤浅表性良性赘生物。受到感染后，约潜伏四个月左右发病。多见于青少年。

 

1 precisely   

adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地

参考例句：

• It's precisely that sort of slick sales-talk that I mistrust.我不相信的正是那种油腔滑调的推销宣传。
• The man adjusted very precisely.那个人调得很准。

2 activates   

使活动，起动，触发( activate的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• Activates the window and displays it in its current size and position. 激活窗口，保持当前的大小及位置不变。
• Pulling out the alarm switch activates alarm and pushing it deactivates it. 闹钟的开和关是通过拔出和按入闹铃开关实现的。