The Last Person in the US Using an Iron Lung Dies
美國最後一名使用鐵肺的人去世
Introduction
Martha Lillard died on June 26 in Oklahoma. She was 78 years old. She was the last person in the US who used an iron lung to breathe.
Martha Lillard 於 6 月 26 日在奧克拉荷馬州去世，享年 78 歲。她是美國最後一名使用鐵肺呼吸的人。
Main Body
Martha got polio when she was five years old. She could not move her body from the neck down. She used a big machine called an iron lung to help her breathe for many years. She went to school and learned a lot.
Martha 五歲時染上了小兒麻痺症。她的身體從頸部以下都無法移動。多年來，她使用一台稱為「鐵肺」的大型機器來幫助呼吸。她堅持上學並學到了很多知識。
Later, the internet helped Martha. She met a man from Egypt named Baha Salh online. They talked for twenty years. Then, Baha came to the US and they got married in February.
後來，網路幫助了 Martha。她在網上認識了一位名叫 Baha Salh 的埃及男人。他們聊了二十年，隨後 Baha 來到美國，他們在二月結婚。
In her last years, Martha got COVID-19 two times. This made her very sick. Also, it was hard to find people to fix her old iron lung machine because the technology was very old.
在她的晚年，Martha 感染了兩次 COVID-19，這讓她病得很嚴重。此外，由於技術過於陳舊，很難找到人來修理她那台舊的鐵肺機。
Conclusion
Now, no one in the United States uses an iron lung to live.
現在，美國已沒有人使用鐵肺來維持生命。
Vocabulary Learning
⏳ Talking about the Past
When we tell a story about someone's life, we change the action word to show it happened before now.
The Pattern: Just add -ed
- Help → Helped
- Talk → Talked
- Learn → Learned
The 'Rule Breakers' (Irregular) Some words change completely. You must memorize these:
- Get → Got
- Go → Went
- Be → Was
Example from the story: "Martha got polio... She went to school... They talked for twenty years."
Quick Tip for A2: If you see -ed, think . If you see was/were, think . This is how we build a history.