BBC 6分钟英语 人流感是真的吗？

From

BBC, learning English. Hello, and welcome to Six Minute English.

I'm Dan, and joining me today is Neil Hyneil.

Hi, everyone, and you bless you.

Are you? OK, I think I'm coming down with something

serious. It's just a case of the sniffles.

The sniffles is an informal way of saying a cold or flu.

It comes from the sniffing sound people make when they have a runny nose.

Yeah? And a runny nose is when liquid mucus keeps leaking from our nose, usually when we're sick.

I'm afraid. You'll just have to soldier on neal to soldier on means to continue despite difficulty dying.

What's it about? Anyway, it's about man flu, and whether it's actually real or just something that men like to complain about.

We'll give you six words and expressions, and of course, I'll quiz question, all right far away.

In a survey conducted by Nuts magazine that asked its readers how long they took to recover from a cold or flu, where women put an average of one and a half days.

What did men put? Was it a one day, B two days, or see three days?

I'm going to say three days.

The threat of manflow is real.

Well, we'll find out later. But let's clarify.

Manflu is the tendency that many people believe men have to complain about a minor illness, such as a cold or flu, and act as if they were suffering from something a lot more serious.

Yes, but science cannot say whether men do actually suffer more than women, or if men just had to complain more.

Let's hear from this British couple about whether they think man flu is real or not.

Men definitely do suffer a lot more, I think, than women do when we get flu.

Yeah, I'm not so convinced. I feel lately, just complain more.

I was ill recently, and I just carried on and went to work and everything.

And when Chris had got sick recently, he was on the sofa and couldn't really do anything.

So and it seems that it's not just in the UK.

Listen to this BBC journalist interviewing a woman from Europe.

You're from the Netherlands. Have you ever accused your boyfriend of having man flu?

Oh, absolutely yes. Yeah. What have you accused him of doing?

Whining. Whining is when someone complains repeatedly and often in an annoying way, about something.

So there certainly seems to be something there, but nothing has been proven, right?

Well, a recent scientific study has indicated that there could be something to man flu.

After all, doctor Kyle Sue, an Assistant Professor of Family Medicine at Memorial University of Newfoundland in Canada, has suggested that there could be a difference between men and women when it comes to respiratory diseases, respiratory meaning related to breathing.

He says that there was already a lot of evidence from existing studies suggesting men experience worse, longer lasting symptoms.

Symptoms are the feelings of illness caused by a disease.

Listen to him explain why this is.

It seems that higher the testosterone levels lower the immune response to these types of infections, whereas the higher the estrogen level, the stronger the immune response.

Testosterone and estrogen are hormones that exist in both men and women.

Testosterone is higher in males and estrogen is higher in females.

Doctor sue's research suggests that the more estrogen a person has, the better able they are to fight off the infection.

That's it, then man flu is real.

Hold your horses, neil. There are two problems.

1st of all, the Royal College of GPS in the UK says that there is no such thing as man flew.

And secondly, even Doctor Sue admits that these results, including his own, are only suggestive and not definitive.

So basically, he's saying that there is a suggestion that man flu exists, that the evidence so far cannot say for sure exactly.

More studies need to be done.

But you know what? We can be sure about?

The answer to this week's quiz question I asked you in a survey conducted by Nuts magazine that asked its readers how long they took to recover from a cold or flu, where women put an average of one and a half days.

What did men put? A One day?

B, two days, or C? Three days?

And I said, three days. And you were right.

Good. The men said they took twice as long to recover.

It must be all that madly testosterone.

Let's review our vocabulary, shall we?

Our 1st was the sniffles. If you have the sniffles, you have a cold.

Informally speaking, what's the best cure for the sniffles?

Now, stay in bed and sweat it out.

My mom always said, just make sure you have lots of tissues to deal with your runny nose.

That's when a person's nose leaks mucus, usually because they're ill.

Yuck. Next, we had soldier on This Frasal verb means to continue despite difficulty.

When was the last time you had to soldier on Neil?

A few days ago when I went the whole day without eating any lunch?

Then we had man flu. That's

the name given to the situation where a person, often a man, tends to complain and exaggerate a small illness, such as a cold.

Do you do that? Dan? I'm sure my wife would say, I do.

Next we had whining. If you wine, you complain repeatedly and often in an annoying way, like my children did last time.

I didn't buy the ice cream.

And finally, we had symptoms. These are the feelings of illness caused by a disease.

What are the symptoms of flu?

Dad? A headache, aching muscles. Oh, in a fever.

And that's the end of this six minute English.

Don't forget to check out our youtube, facebook, twitter and Instagram pages.

There. You made it. You can collapse now.

Bye, bye.

扫码查看听力音频