Ejercicio B1 · Inglés PAU Valencia Extraordinaria 2021

TEXT B / TEXTO B

DO WE HAVE TO AGE?

When the biologist Andrew Steele tells people that we might one day cure ageing as if it were any other disease, they are often skeptical. He understands the reaction: ageing is an inescapable fact of life – we’re born and we grow old. However, “anti-ageing medicine would identify the causes of dysfunction as we get older, then slow their progression or reverse them entirely,” Steele reports.

The hope isn’t that we live longer for the sake of it, it is that we live longer in good health. Humans have searched for a cure for ageing for thousands of years. In the past, countless people made lengthy, futile quests for life-extending elixirs. Lately, research has accelerated. A 2018 study extended the life expectancy of mice by 10%, though it comes with side-effects, including the loss of hair. Last year, scientists transplanted cells from young mice into elderly ones, adding three months to their lives, which in equivalent human terms could be worth more than a decade.

To Steele this is all thrilling, although it is the fact that human trials have begun that excites him most. A recent study found that a combination of hormones and drugs helps rejuvenate some organs, which degenerate rapidly with age. “Research foreshadows a future where ageing will be treated,” Steele says, “We are likely to have a drug that treats ageing in the next 10 years.” Steele isn’t talking about immortality, but science which will make lifespans longer than what we currently consider normal.

Adapted from an article by Alex Moshakis, The Observer, 3-1-2021

Part I. Reading Comprehension

B1. Answer the following questions using your own words but taking into account the information in the text. (2 points: 1 point each)

a.

What would the benefits of medicine against age be?

b.

Have there been efforts to stop getting old in history?