Infectious agent of the rabies received from the dog bite

started propagation. *

All his life Louis Pasteur had to defena his ideas, his

methods and the results of his research from criticism.

But his opponents gradually dwindled away, and this

French scientist attained fame and the gratitude of entire

mankind during his lifetime. His name was given to many

microorganisms; several medals were struck in his honour;

the sterilizing of foods and liquids by heating earned the

name of pasteurization, and, following the opening of the

Pasteur Institute in Paris in 1888, research institutions

named after him also started to appear jn other countries!

Scientists are usually divided into romanticists and

classics. Louis Pasteur thought imagination was necessary

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for a mart of science, nevertheless, he checked up on afl

his ideas and hypothesis by staging thorough experiments.

He was his own most exacting critic. During his life Louis

Pasteur stressed many times the importance of the

experimental method in scientific research, and was of the

opinion that only this method secured the progress of science.

He initiated several sciences and founded microbiology,

but at the same time he thought it incorrect to divide the^

sciences into theoretical and practical ones. He used to say

that there are theoretical sciences and applied sciences,

whfch are as closely associated as are fruit and the

that bore it. The practical benefits which L. Pasteur's work

brought to. all mankind are incalculable. :

On the day of the 150th anniversary of his birth, w«

remember with gratitude the professional career of this

outstanding scientist, a great humanist, an unequalled

master in experimentation, and a true patriot of his

Motherland.

I. Make a short summary of the texts and say which

ideas of the texts attracted your attention most of all.

II. Discuss the following questions with your fellow

students: ,

1. What can you say about the biography of

Louis Pasteur?

2. Read the life of Pasteur and try to decide

which of his discoveries are of the greatest benefit

to mankind? Describe these discoveries.

3-. What was one of Pasteur's first discoveries?

4. How did they formerly treat people bitten by

mad animals?

5. Speak on the episode with the little boy, bitten

by a mad dog and saved by Louis Pasteur. .

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION — WORLDWIDE

CONCERN

As a higly industrialized state which accounts for

20 per cent of the world's industrial production, tfie

Soviet Union cannot ignore the problem of environmental

protection...

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Nature conservation has always been an important

part of Soviet domestic and foreign policy. Even in the

formative years of Soviet government Lenin, the founder

and leader of our state, signed more than a hundred

documents relating to the preservation and rational use of

natural resources. As our country's economy developed,

ecological issues became increasingly important for the

state, and about 20 years 5go conservation legislation

was adopted by the Union Republics.

The next step in the growing official attention to

environmental protection began with the inclusion, since 1975,

of a special section on nature conservation and rational

use of the natural resources in the annual and long-term

economic and social development plans. And ultimately,

environmental protection became a constitutional

principle, appearing in the new USSR Constitution of 1977,

the first constitution ever to make it so. From this one can

see that the ecology and its protection are considered a

matter for the entire country, and appropriate measures

are stipulated in all-Union legislation and in the

legislation of the Union Republics.

To make state policy in environmental protection more

- effective, theJJSSR State Committee for

gy and Control of Natural Environment was established

by government decree. It is responsible for the

organization and the activities of a state system of environmental

supervision and control for regulating the utilization of

urban and industrial air basins and control over the

sources of their pollution, and for the elaboration of the

maximum levels of allowable discharge of pollutants into the.

atmosphere and seeing that they are met. It will also look

over planned location of^new factories, etc., and the

reconstruction of factories and other structures to see that

they meet anti-pollution requirements.

Even now, there are 1,000 control stations in 250

Soviet cities keeping a constant watch ov$r the air, 1,200

stations for checking inland fresh water, 1,600 stations

checking the seas, and 2>700 posts for soil checkup.

The USSR was the first country to establish maximum

levels of harmful substances for the air and water. Qne of

the ways we keep big city air pure is through the broad

use of central, heating systems. All the large factories

built recently have purification systems. More than 50 per

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cent of industrial water needs are met by reusing water.

And in the near future our new chemical and

petrochemical plants will be based on wasteless technology.

Both government and public organizations are

involved in ecological protection; we have nature conservation

societies throughout the Union Republics which supervise

the observance of the relevant legislation^ and publicize

the need ta protect the environment and to rationally use

and renew natural resources. Their praiseworthy work

is backed by popular sentiment and by local authorities.

International cooperation — We cannot

talk about state's environmental protection measures

without mentioning its extensive international efforts in

the field.

First comes cooperation with the socialist countries.

In 1972, the CMEA Committee for Scientific and Technical

Cooperation formed a special council to examine the basic

direction of environmental research, coordinate efforts

and diffuse the respective experience among the socialist

countries. There are coordinated scientific programmes\"

for preventing environmental pollution, industrial use

of waste, developing wasteless technologies and closed

water-supply cycles, and for the conservation and

improvement of natural landscapes. A single system of 155 basic

environmental indicators has been drawn up to coordinate

the relevant activities of the socialist countries.

The USSR takes part in all the main international

environmental protection programmes sponsored by

various international organizations.

The 'Soviet Union initiated an all-European meeting

on cooperation in environmental protection, and supports

all preparatory efforts towards it. We seek to ensure that

they are finalized on a generally acceptable platform as

soon as possible so that the meeting can take place this

year. We believejthat the proposed agenda, which includes

the development*of new and modernization of the existing

non-polluting low-waste technologies, and questions of

across-bordfer drift of pollutants, is urgent and important

for all the countries which took part in the European

Conference for Security and Cooperation.

The Soviet Uniort also believes that bilateral

cooperation between states with different social systems is equally

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