SAT Writing and Language Practice Test 23

Questions 34-44 refer to the following information.

Goodnight, sleep tight…

[1]

They are the horror of every city-dweller and international traveler. You can’t see them. You only see their aftermath, usually in the form that becomes more uncomfortable as the day 34 of an itchy welt goes on. Bed bugs are the silent feeders: they come out at night and disappear with the light of morning. They hide in the unseen places in the mattress or in the cracks of the floor. Like the most annoying vampires in the world, 35 human blood is the food of bed bugs.

[2]

Interest in bed bugs seems to be nearly as old as written history itself. 36 They were not the nuisance then that they have since become. Remember, previous ages believed in the medicinal value of leeches and blood-letting, and bed bugs were seen as helping to extract the toxins that came from snake bites or ear infections 37 by removing them.

[3]

By the twentieth century, however, bed bugs were seen to be the nuisance that 38 they are. This was in part due to 39 there prevalence: in 1933, the UK Ministry of Health reported that all the houses in many areas of the country had some bed-bug infestation. Military bases during World War II had significant problems with bed-bug infestation as the bugs appeared all over Europe.

[4]

With increased public awareness and some advances in pesticides, bed bugs were nearly eradicated from the United States in the 1940s, though they reemerged as an urban menace in the 1980s. 40 No one is entirely clear on the reason, though scientists hypothesize that the resurgence of bed bugs is due to increased pesticide 41 resistants and international travel. The nuisance is now treated 42 locally. Though the lifespan and long dormancy of the bed bugs have led many to believe that the problem may be a permanent one.

[5]

Today, bed bugs are still mainly considered a nuisance. They cost renters and owners millions of dollars each year in exterminator fees and infested furniture replacement. But a recent study has shown that we may have a new reason to worry about the bugs. Now, some research has shown that bed bugs can transmit disease, a practice of which they were long believed incapable. A study documented in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene showed that bed bugs could transmit Chagas disease between mice, 43 which many objected to as being inhumane.

[6]

If these findings are true, then bed bugs may be a more significant public health threat than was previously believed. Like mosquitoes in malaria-ridden countries, bed bugs may be redefined as a true menace, rather than just an itchy nuisance. 44