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If they were just another product, the market would work its usual magic-supply would respond to high prices and rise to meet su

admin2015-10-20  57
问题     If they were just another product, the market would work its usual magic-supply would respond to high prices and rise to meet surging demand. But human kidneys are no ordinary commodity. Trading them is banned in most countries. So supply depends largely on the charity of individuals. Unsurprisingly, with altruism the only incentive, not enough people offer.
    Kidneys are the subject of a quietly growing global drama. As people in the rich world live longer and grow fatter, queues for kidneys are lengthening fast: at a rate of 7% a year in America, for example, where last year 4,039 people died waiting. Doctors are allowing older and more sluggish kidneys to be transplanted. Ailing, rich patients are buying kidneys from the poor and desperate in burgeoning black markets.
    In the face of all this, most countries are sticking with the worst of all policy options. Governments place the burden on their citizens to volunteer organs. A few European countries, including Spain, manage to push up supply a bit by presuming citizens’ consent to having their organs transplanted when they die unless they specify otherwise. Whether or not such presumed consent is morally right, it does not solve the supply problem, in Spain or elsewhere. On the other hand, if just 0.06% of healthy Americans aged between 19 and 65 parted with one kidney, the country would have no waiting list.
    The way to encourage this is to legalize the sale of kidneys. That’s what Iran has done. An officially approved patients’ organization oversees the transactions. Donors get $2,000-4,000. The waiting list has been eliminated. Many people will find the very idea of individuals selling their organs repulsive. Yet an organ market, in body parts of deceased people, already exists. Companies make millions out of it. It seems perverse, then, to exclude individuals.
    With proper regulation, a kidney market would be a big improvement on the current, sorry state of affairs. Sellers could be checked for disease and drug use, and cared for after operations. They could, for instance, receive health insurance as part of their payment—which would be cheap because properly screened donors appear to live longer than the average Joe with two kidneys. Buyers would get better kidneys, faster. Both sellers and buyers would do better than in the illegal market, where much of the money goes to the middleman. Instinct often trumps logic. Sometimes that’s right. But in this case, the instinct that selling bits of oneself is wrong leads to many premature deaths and much suffering. The logical answer, in this case, is the humane one.
Why did the market fail to work its usual magic on human kidneys?
选项 A、The theory of demand and supply is not applicable here.
B、Supply did not respond to high prices or meet fast growing demand.
C、Supply of human kidneys depends on charity rather than market.
D、Human kidneys are not such ordinary goods as shoes, clothes, etc.
答案D
解析 事实细节题。考查因果细节，根据usual magic定位到第一段。其中讲到市场对一般商品才能发挥其一贯的魔力，肾脏并非一般商品，所以市场失去魔力，故D项正确。
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