Directions: Read the following text. Choose the best word(s) for each numbered blank.
Wholesale prices in July rose more sharply than expected and at a faster rate than consumer prices, (1) that businesses were still protecting consumers (2) the full brunt (冲击) of higher energy costs.
The Producer Price Index, (3) measures what producers receive for goods and services, (4) 1 percent in July, the Labor Department reported yesterday, double (5) economists had been expecting and a sharp turnaround from fiat prices in June. Excluding (6) and energy, the core index of producer prices rose 0.4 percent, (7) than the 0.1 percent that economists had (8) Much of that increase was a result of an (9) increase in car and truck prices.
On Tuesday, the Labor Department said the (10) that consumers paid for goods and services in July were (11) 0.5 percent over all, and up 0.1 percent, excluding food and energy.
(12) the overall rise in both consumer and producer prices (13) caused by energy costs, which increased 4.4 percent in the month. (Wholesale food prices (14) 0.3 percent in July. ) (15) July 2004, wholesale prices were up 4.6 percent; the core rate (16) 2.8 percent, its fastest pace since 1995．Typically, increases in the Producer Price Index indicate similar changes in the consumer index (17) businesses recoup (补偿) higher costs from customers. (18) for much of this expansion, which started (19) the end of 2001, that has not been the (20) . In fact, many businesses like automakers have been aggressively discounting their products.

1（）

A．Quebec’s resistance to a national agency is provincialist ideology. One of the first advocates for national list was a researcher at Laval University. Quebec’s Drug Insurance Fund has seen its costs skyrocket with annual increases from 14.3 per cent to 26.8 percent !
B．Or they could read Mr. Kirby’s report : "The substantial buying power of such an agency would strengthen the public prescription-drug insurance plans to negotiate the lowest possible purchase prices from drug companies"
C．What does "national" mean Roy Romanow and Senator Michael Kirby recommended a federal-provincial body much like the recently created National Health Council.
D．The problem is simple and stark: health-care costs have been, are, and will continue to increase faster than government revenues.
E．According to the Canadian Institute for Health Information, prescription drug costs have risen since 1997 at twice the rate of overall heahh-care spending. Part of the increase comes from drugs being used to replace other kinds of treatments. Part of it arises from new drugs costing more than older kinds. Part of it is higher prices.
F．So, if the provinces want to run the health-care show, they should prove they can run it, starting with an interprovincial health list that would end duplication, save administrative costs, prevent one province from being played off against another, and bargain for better drug prices.
G．Of course the pharmaceutical companies will scream. They like divided buyers, they can lobby better that way. They can use the threat of removing jobs from one province to another. They can hope that, if one province includes a drug on its list, the pressure will cause others to include it on theirs. They wouldn’t like a national agency, but self- interest would lead them to deal with it.

A．encourage young people to take up science
B．describe the process of a scientific competition
C．show scientists what young people can do
D．report on a new scientific technique