Exercícios de Passive Voice

(EPCAR EA/2010)

All light on the night

01 Our cities and tows are far from silent at 02 night. As most of __________ are going to bed, a lot of 03 workers are just going to their jobs. It is estimated 04 that up to a fifth of the working population carries 05 out its duties at night – running hospitals and 06 maintaining power stations, for example.
07 There is one problem: They have the same 08 biological clock as day workers. Night workers often 09 have trouble sleeping through the day, and 10 sometimes find __________ harder to stay awake, which 11 means mistakes are more likely to happen. Dr 12 Lawrence Smith, a psychologist, discovered that 13 among people who do the same job, night workers 14 suffered 20% more injuries than day workers.
15 He is now testing the theory that the light can 16 be used to fool the human body clock. The body clock 17 appears to be influenced by light, because one 18 chemical at its disposal is sensitive to light.

Adapted from Advance your English

The Passive Voice of the sentence ‘He is now testing the theory…’ (ref. 15) is

(ESPM SP/2010)

TV Will Save the World
By Charles Kenny

‘Forget Twitter and Facebook, Google and the Kindle. Forget the latest sleek iGadget. Television is still the most influential medium around. Indeed, for many of the poorest regions of the world, it remains the next big thing – poised, finally, to attain truly global ubiquity. And that is a good thing, because the TV revolution is changing lives for the better.

Across the developing world, around 45% of households had a TV in 1995; by 2005 the number had climbed above 60%. That’s some way behind the U.S., where there are more TVs than people, but it dwarfs worldwide Internet access. Five million more households in sub-Saharan Africa will get a TV over the next five years. In 2005, after the fall of the Taliban, which had outlawed TV, 1 in 5 Afghans had one. The global total is another 150 million by 2013 – pushing the numbers to well beyond two-thirds of households.

Television’s most transformative impact will be on the lives of women. In India, researchers Robert Jensen and Emily Oster found that when cable TV reached villages, women were more likely to go to the market without their husbands’ permission and less likely to want a boy rather than a girl. They were more likely to make decisions over child health care and less likely to think that men had the right to beat their wives. TV is also a powerful medium for adult education. In the Indian state of Gujarat, Chitrageet is a hugely popular show that plays Bollywood song and dance clips. The routines are subtitled in Gujarati. Within six months, viewers had made a small but significant improvement in their reading skills.

Too much TV has been associated with violence, obesity and social isolation. But TV is having a positive impact on the lives of billions worldwide, and as the spread of mobile TV, video cameras and YouTube democratize both access and content, it will become an even greater force for humbling tyrannical governments and tyrannical husbands alike.

(Wednesday, Mar. 11, 2010 http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1971133_1971110_1971118,00.html)

“TV will save the world” – in the passive voice:

(UPE/2010)

BRAZIL’S GROWING POWER

With the help of clever agronomists, modern technology and the callused hands of pioneers in scores of towns, Brazil has become the world’s newest agricultural superpower. Last year, while the national economy struggle, Brazilian farmers reaped another bountiful harvest of commodity crops. Grain production, for example, topped 123 million tons – double the figure of a decade ago. While Brazil’s overall jobless rate spiked to 8 percent last year, rural employment grew by 6.5 percent, and 10 percent in the frontier states of Mato Grosso, Tocantins and Goiás.

Brazil has long been a powerhouse producer of coffee and sugar. But now the country’s farmers and agribusinesses are extending their global reach, grabbing market share with new crops and lapping the competition in industrialized farm goods like orange juice, alcohol, tobacco and leather hides. Led by the cerrado pioneers, Brazil in 2002 surpassed the United States as the world’s largest exporter of soybeans, soybean oil and soybean meal. In addition, the country recently became the world’s largest exporter of beef, passing Australia.

And while quantity is important, so is quality. Brazil’s cattle herds eat only grass and soymeal, not feed made from ground animal parts that some experts suspect is responsible for the general spread of madcow disease. Agribusiness now accounts for more than a quarter of the country’s 4600 billion gross domestic product, and employs around 20 million people, roughly 37 percent of Brazil’s total work force.

Brazilian farmers have boosted crop production so high that the country now ranks as the world’s fourthleading exporter of agricultural products. (…) Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has made agricultural-trade liberalization a key policy objective for his administration.
LIBERATO, Wilson. Inglês Doorway. Coleção Delta. Ensino Médio. Caderno de Atividades. FTD. 2004

The sentence “Brazil’s cattle herds eat only grass and soymeal” in passive voice is

(UFV MG/2010)

The Benefits of a New Space Race

1In October 2003 China became only the third nation to launch a human into space aboard its own rocket. Colonel Yang 2Liwei, China’s first taikonaut, orbited the Earth for barely a day before returning, slightly shaken, to a landing in Mongolia. It was a 3significant technical achievement for a country that has been struggling to modernize its economy and its technology, and the 4Chinese government trumpeted it to its people and the world. Although Yang’s flight received considerable attention around the 5globe, what was almost ignored is the fact that after his feet were firmly on the ground, the orbital module from his Shenzhou 5 6spacecraft continued to circle the earth, carrying several military payloads. The module is apparently equipped both with a 7reconnaissance camera capable of spotting objects on the ground about a yard long, and an array of antennas for intercepting radar 8and other signals from hundreds of miles away. Despite this, Shenzhou is not something the United States should be concerned 9about, but should actually encourage.
10China is pursuing a human space program for three primary reasons: international prestige, domestic pacification, and 11industrial policy. A human space program enhances China’s status as a major power, at least within the Pacific region. It also feeds 12nationalist hunger among the populace, making them proud of the achievements of their country even while they realize that they 13live under an authoritarian and corrupt government—bread and circuses for the masses. Finally, a Chinese “white paper” about 14space makes clear that the Chinese anticipate numerous technological developments to flow from their space program. Building a 15space capability requires improvements in manufacturing, computers and materials that the Chinese hope to use in other areas of 16their economy. Because China is a rival to the United States, it is not in American interests to see them gain international prestige, 17pacify an oppressed population, or improve their technology.
18But now that China has entered the human spaceflight arena, and President Bush has proposed a new exploration plan, 19America’s best move might be to engage the Chinese in future cooperation in human spaceflight, such as dangling the possibility of 20sending future missions to the International Space Station, and possibly even future competition in this realm as well. For several 21years the Western science press has been filled with articles about China’s space ambitions. Reporters have claimed that China has 22bold plans for a large human spaceflight program, including everything from space stations to Moon landings. Many of these reports, 23however, have generated bad translations of articles originally published in Chinese, or handwaved away the laws of physics. 24China’s space ambitions are in reality much less dramatic and the requirements to achieve some of these goals much higher than 25the press has implied. Although most of these stories are false, it would be in America’s best interest if they are true, and a shrewd 26strategy to encourage China’s peaceful exploration of space, with humans, is called for.
27Human spaceflight is enormously expensive, even in places where labor is cheap. Despite the slow and deliberate pace of 28the Chinese human spaceflight program so far, it is clear that China has spent a considerable amount of money to acquire this new 29capability—nearly $2 billion. In addition to developing a spacecraft and launching four previous unmanned missions, China has also 30built a new rocket, a new launch pad, and a large assembly building for integrating all of the equipment, as well as various other 31support facilities, such as a tracking station in Namibia and several tracking ships. Recovery forces such as helicopters and aircraft 32cost additional money. China may also demonstrate the value of spaceflight at diverting domestic attention from government 33oppression and corruption. But the Chinese government is going to do this anyway with other events, such as the 2008 Olympics. 34As for China’s industrial policy, the United States long ago learned that the spin-off argument is a weak one; although developing 35spacecraft does produce some useful technologies, it is generally inefficient. If you want a faster computer chip, then develop one; 36there is no need to go to the Moon to do so. The only demonstrated payoff of human spaceflight is prestige.
(Dwayne A. Day. Available in http://www.thespacereview.com/article/137/1. Retrieved on July 23, 2009. Adapted.)

The passive structure “[…] the Western science press has been filled with articles […]” (ref. 21) can be rewritten in the active voice as:

(UECE CE/2015)

Clifford the Big Red Dog looks fabulous on an iPad. He sounds good, too — tap the screen and hear him pant as a blue truck roars into the frame. “Go, truck, go!” cheers the narrator. But does this count as story time? Or is it just screen time for babies? It is a question that parents, pediatricians and researchers are struggling to answer as children’s books, just like all the other ones, migrate to digital media.
For years, child development experts have advised parents to read to their children early and often, citing studies showing its linguistic, verbal and social benefits. In June, the American Academy of Pediatrics advised doctors to remind parents at every visit that they should read to their children from birth, prescribing books as enthusiastically as vaccines and vegetables.
On the other hand, the academy strongly recommends no screen time for children under 2, and less than two hours a day for older children.
At a time when reading increasingly means swiping pages on a device, and app stores are bursting with reading programs and learning games aimed at infants and preschoolers, which bit of guidance should parents heed?
The answer, researchers say, is not yet entirely clear. “We know how children learn to read,” said Kyle Snow, the applied research director at the National Association for the Education of Young Children. “But we don’t know how that process will be affected by digital technology.”
Part of the problem is the newness of the devices. Tablets and e-readers have not been in widespread use long enough for the sorts of extended studies that will reveal their effects on learning.
Dr. Pamela High, the pediatrician who wrote the June policy for the pediatrics group, said electronic books were intentionally not addressed. “We tried to do a strongly evidence-based policy statement on the issue of reading starting at a very young age,” she said. “And there isn’t any data, really, on e-books.”
But a handful of new studies suggest that reading to a child from an electronic device undercuts the dynamic that drives language development. “There’s a lot of interaction when you’re reading a book with your child,” Dr. High said. “You’re turning pages, pointing at pictures, talking about the story. Those things are lost somewhat when you’re using an e-book.”
In a 2013 study, researchers found that children ages 3 to 5 whose parents read to them from an electronic book had lower reading comprehension than children whose parents used traditional books. Part of the reason, they said, was that parents and children using an electronic device spent more time focusing on the device itself than on the story (a conclusion shared by at least two other studies).
“Parents were literally putting their hands over the kids’ hands and saying, ‘Wait, don’t press the button yet. Finish this up first,’ ” said Dr. Julia Parish-Morris, a developmental psychologist at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and the lead author of the 2013 study that was conducted at Temple University. Parents who used conventional books were more likely to engage in what education researchers call “dialogic reading,” the sort of back-and-forth discussion of the story and its relation to the child’s life that research has shown are key to a child’s linguistic development.
Complicating matters is that fewer and fewer children’s e-books can strictly be described as books, say researchers. As technology evolves, publishers are adding bells and whistles that encourage detours. “What we’re really after in reading to our children is behavior that sparks a conversation,” said Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, a professor of psychology at Temple and co-author of the 2013 study. “But if that book has things that disrupt the conversation, like a game plopped right in the middle of the story, then it’s not offering you the same advantages as an old-fashioned book.”
Of course, e-book publishers and app developers point to interactivity as an educational advantage, not a distraction. Many of those bells and whistles — Clifford’s bark, the sleepy narration of “Goodnight Moon,” the appearance of the word “ham” when a child taps the ham in the Green Eggs and Ham app — help the child pick up language, they say.
There is some evidence to bear out those claims, at least in relation to other technologies. A study by the University of Wisconsin in 2013 found that 2-year-olds learned words faster with an interactive app as opposed to one that required no action.
But when it comes to learning language, researchers say, no piece of technology can substitute for a live instructor — even if the child appears to be paying close attention.
Patricia K. Kuhl, a director of the Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences at the University of Washington, led a study in 2003 that compared a group of 9-month-old babies who were addressed in Mandarin by a live instructor with a group addressed in Mandarin by an instructor on a DVD. Children in a third group were exposed only to English.
“The way the kids were staring at the screen, it seemed obvious they would learn better from the DVDs,” she said. But brain scans and language testing revealed that the DVD group “learned absolutely nothing,” Dr. Kuhl said. “Their brain measures looked just like the control group that had just been exposed to English.
The only group that learned was the live social interaction group.” In other words, “it’s being talked with, not being talked at,” that teaches children language, Dr. Hirsh-Pasek said.
Similarly, perhaps the biggest threat posed by e-books that read themselves to children, or engage them with games, is that they could lull parents into abdicating their educational responsibilities, said Mr. Snow of the National Association for the Education of Young Children.
“There’s the possibility for e-books to become the TV babysitters of this generation,” he said. “We don’t want parents to say, ‘There’s no reason for me to sit here and turn pages and tell my child how to read the word, because my iPad can do it.’ ”
But parents may find it difficult to avoid resorting to tablets. Even literacy advocates say the guidelines can be hard to follow, and that allowing limited screen time is not high on the list of parental missteps. “You might have an infant and think you’re down with the A.A.P. guidelines, and you don’t want your baby in front of a screen, but then you have a grandparent on Skype,” Mr. Snow said. “Should you really be tearing yourself apart? Maybe it’s not the world’s worst thing.”
“The issue is when you’re in the other room and Skyping with the baby cause he likes it,” he said. Even if screen time is here to stay as a part of American childhood, good old-fashioned books seem unlikely to disappear anytime soon. Parents note that there is an emotional component to paper-and-ink storybooks that, so far, does not seem to extend to their electronic counterparts, however engaging.
From: http://www.nytimes.com, OCT. 11, 2014

The clause “(…) when you’re using an e-book” in the passive form is

(Mackenzie SP/2015)

Female Prisoners Post Sexy Pictures of Themselves on Social Network
ESTELITA HASS CARAZZAI
FROM CURITIBA

At least two detainees have taken pictures and published them on social networking sites from inside Guarapuava Public Jail, in the state of Paraná.
The pictures, taken on a phone, were found by prison guards and posted online last April.
The 30 year-old detainees are in jail after being accused of drug trafficking. Both are serving provisional sentences, and are yet to be convicted.
One has been in jail since April, and the other for a year.
Detainees are not granted possession of cell phones, and, due to this breach, they were awarded a disciplinary sanction and have since been prevented from receiving visits or food sent by family members for 30 days.
Additionally, this occurrence may prevent them from shortening their sentences if they are eventually convicted.
They appear posing in underwear on concrete beds in the female dormitory, which is decorated with animal print.
After the prison guards discovered the images, they inspected the room the two women shared and found the cell phone used to take the pictures.
“This unfortunately happens. Detainees can hide things very well”, the prison chief, Altemir Nascimento, said.
According to Nascimento, 40 cell phones have been seized so far this year in the prison (which also houses men).

CELL PHONE THROWING
The location of the prison in downtown Guarapuava makes matters worse. According to the prison chief, during sunbathing, pedestrians toss cell phones over the wall.
“Cell phones and drugs are thrown over the wall. This happens regularly. On every sunny day two or three items are thrown”, Nascimento said.
At the beginning of the year, in order to bring the “deliveries” to a halt, the prison chief decided to install a protective net over the patio. Since then 77 cell phones have been caught on the net.
http://www1.folha.uol.com.br/internacional/

The only alternative where all the phrases are in the PASSIVE VOICE is

(UERJ/2019)

The effect of climate change on epidemic risk

1 The potential impacts of climate change have returned to headlines in recent weeks as scientists, 2 activists and policy makers try to understand the possible implications of a warming planet. While 3 rising temperatures and sea levels are important to be considered, changing climate patterns can 4 have vast implications for epidemic risk as well.

5 Changes in global climate patterns have been widely discussed; however, rising temperatures 6 also have implications for risk reduction and management, including impacts on infectious disease 7 epidemics. With 2016 the hottest year ever recorded and 2017 following suit, we anticipate a 8 continued growth in the distribution of disease agents, like mosquitoes and ticks. These can 9 spread illnesses such as zika, yellow fever and dengue to areas where they previously could not be 10 effectively transmitted.

11 As predicted by climate scientists, increases in extreme weather events may also lead to increases 12 in infectious disease outbreaks. Epidemics have previously been seen as a consequence of natural 13 disasters, which can lead to displaced and crowded populations, the ideal situation for infection 14 transmission. Severe rainfall or flooding is particularly effective at creating environments suitable 15 for the transmission and propagation of infectious diseases, such as measles or cholera.

16 Even without rising to the level of a natural catastrophe, significant variation in weather patterns 17 can result in changes in human and animal interactions, increasing the potential for pathogens to 18 move from animals into human populations. For example, unusually heavy rains may predispose 19 regions to ebola outbreaks by creating more favorable environments for bats hosting the virus. 20 Similarly, food scarcity brought about by drought, political instability or animal disease may lead to 21 more animal hunting, therefore raising the risk for ebola virus epidemic.

22 It is important to take note of the impact of climate change on epidemic risk, but it is equally 23 important to prepare for its impact on global health. The global health community has largely come 24 to realize that public health preparedness is crucial to responding efficiently to infectious disease 25 outbreaks. For this reason, our work is, then, centered around helping governments manage and 26 quantify infectious disease risk. Besides, regardless of weather patterns, insights into epidemics 27 and into mechanisms for ensuring adequate support are critical for managing this risk.

28 Since the public health community agrees that the question is not if another outbreak will happen, 29 but when, the steps we take in the coming years to prepare for and reduce the increasing frequency 30 of outbreaks will determine the broader implications these diseases have on our world.
contagionlive.com

One of the marked characteristics of scientific texts is the presence of passive voice.

An example from the text that illustrates this characteristic is indicated in:

(UEFS BA/2018)

‘I wish they could be saved’:
The victims of India’s poisonous dust

Silicosis, which kills thousands around the world, is caused by inhaling silica dust found in rock, sand, quartz and many building materials. It can lead to breathing difficulties, regular coughing, chest pains and, sometimes, tuberculosis and other chest infections.
Two years ago, at the age of 17, Urmila Yadav, from the village of Budhpura, located in the north-western state of Rajasthan, became one of the youngest certified cases of silicosis in India. Her case is singular; even in this village where mining and quarry1 work is the only occupation and silicosis is a commonplace disease that strikes almost every family, it is mostly men who are affected.
Rajasthan has been the epicentre of silicosis in India. The number of silicosis certified patients in the state, according to government data, is 8 441 (the figures are available up to April 2017). Actual numbers are likely to be much higher, claim advocacy groups. It is the only state to have a monetary relief mechanism for certified patients, in place since 2013; however, the onus is on workers to get a diagnosis and prove their occupational history, which is challenging in an unregulated industry like mining in India.
For a young teenage girl like Urmila to have silicosis is “quite an unusual case”, says Dr Vinod Jangid, responsible for diagnosing silicosis at the medical college in the district of Kota. There could be more children with silicosis but the government will hesitate to certify young people. “If children are diagnosed with silicosis, it means they are either living close to the mines, or they are working in the mines, both of which are illegal.”
Urmila began to work in the stone quarries next to her village in her childhood. It is common here for men to work in mines and for women and children to supplement the family earnings by carving cobblestones by hand. Most of them work in quarries and head back there after classes. “There are many girls in Budhpura who do this work. Some are 15 or 16 years, and some even younger. I wish they can be saved from this work,” Urmila says.
(Sunaina Kumar. http://www.bbc.com, 09.10.2017. Adaptado.)

1 quarry: an open excavation, usually for obtaining building material.

Mark the alternative which contains a verb in the passive voice.

(EPCAR EA/2019)

WHY DO SUPERVILLAINS FASCINATE US? A
PSYCHOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE

1 Why are we fascinated by supervillains? Posing 2 the question is much like asking why evil itself intrigues 3 us, but there’s much more to our continued interest in 4 supervillains than meets the eye. 5 Not only do Lex Luthor, Dracula and the Red Skull 6 run unconstrained by conventional morality, they exist 7 outside the limits of reality itself. Their evil, even at its 8 most realistic, retains a touch of the unreal. 9 But is our fascination with fantastic fiends1 10 healthy? From a psychological perspective, views vary 11 on what drives our enduring interest in superhuman bad 12 guys.
13 Shadow confrontation: Psychiatrist Carl Jung 14 believed we need to confront and understand our own 15 hidden nature to grow as human beings. Healthy 16 confrontation with our shadow selves can unearth new 17 strengths (e.g., Bruce Wayne creating his Dark Knight 18 persona to fight crime), whereas unhealthy attempts at 19 confrontation may involve dwelling on or unleashing the 20 worst parts of ourselves.
21 Wish fulfillment: Sigmund Freud viewed human 22 nature as inherently antisocial, biologically driven by the 23 undisciplined id’s pleasure principle to get what we 24 want when we want it – born to be bad but held back by 25 society. Even if the psyche fully develops its ego 26 (source of self-control) and superego (conscience), 27 Freudians say the id still dwells2 underneath, and it 28 wishes for many selfish things – so it would love to be 29 supervillainous.
30 Hierarchy of needs: Humanistic psychologist 31 Abraham Maslow held that people who haven’t met 32 their most basic needs will have difficulty maturing. If 33 starved for food, you’re unlikely to feel secure. If 34 starved for love and companionship, you’ll have trouble 35 building self-esteem. People who dwell on their deficits 36 may envy and resent others who have more than they 37 do. Some people who are unable to overcome social 38 shortcomings fantasize about obtaining any means, 39 good or bad, to satisfy every need and greed.
40 Conditioning: Ivan Pavlov would say we can learn 41 to associate supervillains with other things we value – 42 like entertainment, strength, freedom or the heroes 43 themselves. Behaviorist B.F. Skinner would likely argue 44 that we can find it reinforcing to watch or read about 45 supervillains, but without knowing what’s reinforcing 46 about them, that’s a bit like saying it’s rewarding 47 because it’s rewarding.
48 Our Motivations for Seeking Out Supervillains
49 Throughout history, humans have been captivated 50 by stories of heroes facing off against superhuman 51 foes3. But what specific rewards, needs, wishes and 52 dark dreams do supervillains satisfy?
53 Freedom: Superpowered characters enjoy 54 freedoms the rest of us don’t. Nobody can arrest 55 Superman unless he lets them (at least not without 56 kryptonite handcuffs). As much time as supervillains 57 spend locked up, they seem to escape as often as they 58 please, to run unconstrained by rules and regulations. 59 Cosplayers who dress like Wonder Woman and 60 Captain America can’t do any crazy thing that crosses 61 their minds without seeming to mock and insult our 62 heroes, whereas those dressed as villains get to go 63 wild. Supervillainy feels liberating.
64 Power: Maybe you envy the power these evil 65 characters wield4. While that’s also a reason to adore 66 superheroes, good guys don’t ache to dominate. 67 Stories like Watchmen and Kingdom Come show how 68 heroes become menaces5 when they try to take over. 69 So when dreaming of superpowers, maybe you relate 70 to characters who dream of power as well, from the 71 Scarecrow (who controls individuals’ fears) to Doctor 72 Doom (who’s perpetually out to dominate the world).
73 Better villain than victim: Physiologically, anger 74 activates us and feels better than anxiety or fear. One 75 who feels victimized and cannot figure out constructive 76 ways to stand up, be strong or become heroic might 77 twist the need for self-assertion into destruction. 78 Alternately, a healthy person simply might focus on how 79 all characters assert themselves in any given story.
80 Better villain equals better hero: A hero only 81 appears as heroic as the challenge he or she must 82 overcome. Great heroes require great villains. Without 83 supercriminals, the world’s finest heroes seem like 84 overpowered brutes nabbing thugs6 unworthy of them. 85 Through myths, legends and lore across time, we have 86 needed heroes who rise to the occasion, overcome 87 great odds7 and take down giants.
88 Facing our fears: Instead of dreading the 89 darkness, you might reduce that dread by shining a 90 light and seeing what’s out there. Fiction can help us 91 feel empowered and enlightened without literally 92 traipsing into mob hangouts8 and poorly lit alleyways9.
93 Exploring the unknown: Our need to challenge 94 the unknown has driven the human race to cover the 95 globe. This powerful curiosity makes us wonder about 96 everything that baffles10 us, including the world’s worst 97 fiends. Knowledge is power, or at least feels like it. 98 When gritty details repulse us, exploring evil through the 99 filter of fiction can help us contemplate humanity’s 100 worst without turning away or dwelling almost 101 voyeuristically on real human tragedy. Even when the 102 fiction is about improbable people doing impossible 103 things, the story’s fantastic nature reassures us that this 104 cannot happen – and therefore we don’t have to turn 105 away.
106 Supervillains’ Ultimate Purpose
107 In the end, our interest in supervillains can be 108 healthy or unhealthy. Even the more maladaptive 109 reasons for such fascination tend to arise from 110 motivations that were originally healthy and natural – 111 frustrated drives that went the wrong way.
112 Remember, though, that superheroic fiction 113 ultimately begins and ends with the heroes. Comic book 114 writers and artists create supervillains, who move in and 115 out as guest stars and supporting cast, first and 116 foremost to reveal how heroic the comics’ stars can be.
(Adapted from https://www.wired.com/2012/07/why-do-supervillainsfascinate-us/)

Glossary:

1. fiend – an evil and cruel person
2. to dwell – remain
3. foe – an enemy
4. to wield – influence, use power
5. menace – threat
6. to nab thugs – arrest criminals
7. odds – probability
8. to traipse into mob hangouts – walk among places where gangs, criminals meet
9. poorly lit alleyways – narrow road or path with little light
10. to baffle – confuse somebody completely

Mark the option in which the sentence is an example of passive voice.

(Fuvest SP/2006)
Australians are not known for their love of boat people.

They famously turned away a small group of Afghan refugees at the height of the war and rather amusingly, ran a scare campaign featuring crocodiles and sharks to deter would-be immigrants. But if global warming continues at its current rate, neighbouring Pacific islands could be lost to floods and Australia will be facing a new kind of intruder: climate refugees.
Although the Red Cross produced a report four years ago estimating that 58 per cent of refugees are caused by environmental factors, no one has made any attempt to tackle the issue1. Oxford University’s Norman Myers recently claimed that there could be an estimated 150 million environmental refugees within the next 50 years, and half of these could land on Australia’s doorstep. But the UN refuses to grant them refugee status, and aid groups and environmentalists squabble over whose responsibility they are.
DAZED & CONFUSED July 2005

Choose the correct passive voice form for: “… no one has made any attempt to tackle the issue.” (ref.1)