Extract:
Toxins and Your Health
Lie out in the sun too much today, and get skin cancer 20 years from now. Smoke too many cigarettes now, and get lung cancer decades down the road. Now there is potentially a third danger to add to this list: be exposed to too much lead, pesticides, or mercury now and have your aging brain become seriously confused during your senior years.
“We’re trying to offer a caution that a portion of what has been called normal aging might in fact be due to ubiquitous environmental exposures like lead,” says Dr. Brian Schwartz of Johns Hopkins University. “The fact that it’s happening with lead is the first proof of the principle that it’s possible.”
A new area of medical research is one that studies how exposure to toxic elements in younger years can result in serious health problems in senior years. It is difficult to research these problems because the only way to do so is to observe people over many years.
Physicians test for lead amounts by seeing how much has accumulated in a person’s shinbone. Testing the blood also often reveals amounts of lead, but that is a sign of recent, not lifelong, exposure. The higher the lifetime lead dose, according to the study, the worse the performance of mental functions, including verbal and visual memory and language ability.
What is the meaning of the word exposed as used in the first paragraph?
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A
Uncovered
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B
Subjected
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C
Visible
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D
Divulged
In the environmental health context, exposed means subjected, experiencing contact with harmful substances that may produce delayed health effects.
A) Uncovered
Uncovered means physically revealed or unprotected, irrelevant to toxin contact. One can be covered yet exposed to airborne toxins, or uncovered without toxin contact.
B) Subjected
Subjected precisely captures exposure's meaning in toxicology: being made to undergo contact with harmful agents. The phrase "be exposed to too much lead" implies involuntary contact with substances that may cause harm, exactly matching "subjected to" environmental toxins.
C) Visible
Visibility concerns perceptibility, not contact with substances. Toxins may be invisible yet still cause exposure; visibility isn't required for exposure to occur.
D) Divulged
Divulged means revealed or disclosed, applying to information, not physical contact with substances. Exposure concerns bodily contact with toxins, not revelation of secrets.
Conclusion
Environmental health terminology uses "exposed" to describe involuntary contact with harmful agents that may produce acute or chronic effects. "Subjected" alone captures this connotation of experiencing contact with potentially damaging substances without consent or protection.