The number of new cases of tuberculosis diagnosed in Country X increas

The number of new cases of tuberculosis diagnosed in Country X increased dramatically this year. The country's news media have speculated that the sharp increase in new cases is the result of the tuberculosis outbreak that occurred in neighboring Country Y last year. Health officials in Country X have therefore proposed that all visitors from Country Y must submit to a medical examination before entering Country X.

Which of the following, if true, most strongly suggests that the proposed medical examinations will not help curb the spread of tuberculosis in Country X?


(A) Country Z, which also neighbors Country Y, has not experienced an increase in cases of tuberculosis.

(B) Current medical technology is not capable of detecting all carriers of tuberculosis.

(C) Country X does not have the resources to examine all visitors from Country Y.

(D) Tuberculosis is not spread through human contact.

(E) Citizens of Country Y will not travel to Country X if the proposal is implemented.

The question stem highlights the word "NOT." However, there is another very important word in the question stem right next to it: "Help."

(B) and (C) suggest that the plan in the question stem will be of limited use. But the question isn't asking us to weaken the idea that the plan will completely solve the problem. It asks us to disprove the idea that the plan will help at all to solve the problem. In cases (B) or (C), the proposal in the stem is no panacea, but it could still be one part in a comprehensive plan to prevent the spread of Tuberculosis. But choice (D) makes it clear that the plan won't help in the slightest--it won't do a thing! That makes (D) the only correct answer to this question.

I see that D is not airtight but the best of worse. D says the main idea that channel of transfer of tuberculosis may not be visitors, but, for instance, it may be infected water in the river that flows from country Y to country X, or imported grain, and etc.

IMO answer is D

a) Country Z, which also neighbors Country Y, has not experienced an increase in cases of tuberculosis. ( NR )
b) Current medical technology is not capable of detecting all carriers of tuberculosis. ( NR )
c) Country X does not have the resources to examine all visitors from Country Y. ( it is about curbing the spread, not eradicating it, so this point doesnt matter. )
d) Tuberculosis is not spread through human contact. ( Incase Tuberculosis is not spread through human contact, the proposal is not sensible , Best Answer )
e) Citizens of Country Y will not travel to Country X if the proposal is implemented. ( NR :- Not Relevant)

An interesting question. First, the use of 'tuberculosis' here is a red herring. CR questions do not test your knowledge of medical conditions; they test your ability to analyze an argument. Our prior knowledge of tuberculosis- that it's spread through human contact- might influence our answer here, and lead us to an incorrect analysis of the argument. Indeed, D asks us to assume something we know to be false in real life. We should not think of tuberculosis at all; we might replace 'tuberculosis' in the question with any other condition- 'insomnia', or 'stress', or 'depression', for example.

Then the structure of the argument becomes clear. There is a 'post hoc ergo propter hoc' fallacy- just because one thing happens after another does not mean one thing was caused by the other. The argument says: "Y had high levels of stress (or whatever you like) last year. X had high levels of stress this year. Therefore stress in Y caused stress in X." This is not a valid argument, at least not without further support. It may just be coincidence that X had high levels of stress the year after Y did. High levels of stress might be caused by environmental factors, economic conditions, political turmoil, etc...

The assumption is that visitors from Y brought 'stress' to X. Answer D suggests that people do not transmit stress- that the cause lies elsewhere. D is the correct answer. It's not 'airtight', of course; we can imagine scenarios where the screening would be helpful even if human contact is not the cause, but these all seem unlikely. D "most strongly suggests" that the screening won't be effective, even if it is not 100% convincing.

I'd note, finally, that B and C must be incorrect, even if we grant the assumption that tuberculosis is contagious. If tuberculosis is contagious, even screening some of the visitors from Y will reduce the spread of the disease. As has been pointed out, the question does not ask whether the medical examinations will completely eradicate tuberculosis. A is incorrect because we have no knowledge of Country Z; Country Z might have been screening all their visitors for tuberculosis for years, which might be the reason Z had no increase. Indeed, were that true, A would help to support the argument, not weaken it.

B and D are good contenders.
In B,the use of "all" strikes the difference.B says that- Current medical technology is not capable of detecting all carriers of tuberculosis but it can detect some carriers.thus, it will help to curb the disease to some extent.

I hope its clear!

OFFICIAL EXPLANATION

Because of the speculation that the tuberculosis outbreak in Country X was the result of an outbreak of tuberculosis in Country Y, health officials in Country X have proposed requiring all visitors from Country Y to undergo a medical examination. We are asked to find a choice that suggests that this proposal will not have the desired effect of curbing the spread of tuberculosis in Country X.
(A) This has no bearing on the situation between Country X and Country Y.

(B) This suggests only that the proposal would not prevent ALL cases. But even if the proposal does not prevent all cases, it could help prevent many.

(C) This suggests only that the proposal would not catch ALL carriers of the disease from Country Y. But even if the proposal does not prevent all cases, it could help prevent many.

(D) CORRECT. This suggests that the visitors from Country Y are not the source of the disease. Thus, testing them would likely do little to curb the spread of the disease.

(E) This does not suggest that the proposal will not help curb the spread of the disease. If the visitors from Country Y are indeed carriers, then their refusal to visit Country X will help curb the disease.
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D. Tuberculosis is not spread through human contact -- In real life, Tuberculosis does spread through contact(communicable diseases). So, probably that influenced my thinking here. Although Tuberculosis is a non-communicable disease(as per D), maybe it does not spread directly from one human to another but via some other agent (like the spread of malaria by a mosquito). So, it does still make sense to do a medical examination of visitors from Country Y.

OA-D is not true in real life. So, can we expect such answers on the GMAT?

Conclusion - the proposed medical examinations will not help curb the spread of tuberculosis in Country X
Type - strengthen

1. What if the majority of people traveling from Country Y to X are citizens of Country X who went to Y as a tourist or on business. So, these people won't qualify in the group all visitors from Country Y and thus will be excluded from the medical screening.

2. What if the majority of people visiting Country X are from Country A but these people visit country Y before visiting Country X. So, these people won't qualify in the group all visitors from Country Y and thus will be excluded from the medical screening.

Visitors from Country Y is different People who visited Country Y recently.

Are 1 and 2 correct strengtheners?

AjiteshArun , GMATNinja , mikemcgarry , egmat , RonPurewal , DmitryFarber , MagooshExpert , ccooley , ChiranjeevSingh, GMATGuruNY , VeritasKarishma , other experts-- please enlighten
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Skywalker18 : I have few doubts in your statements.

OA-D is not true in real life. - Dont we need outside information for come to the conclusion you mentioned. I frankly dont know that this statement is not true untill I have read your statement. Also Are we far sure that whatever written in Gmat statements what so ever is/must always true ? In My short observation i have found many things that are opinion of particular group, in other words some times baseless and some times biased.

I agree to your 2nd point, I have my doubts for All visitors. It should be everyone who is coming from country X.

Looking forward for a good learning. It is going to be fun.

I don't think we should get into this at all. The question stem clearly says Which of the following, if true, most strongly suggests...
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AjiteshArun - please enlighten on the below as well -

1. What if the majority of people traveling from Country Y to X are citizens of Country X who went to Y as a tourist or on business. So, these people won't qualify in the group all visitors from Country Y and thus will be excluded from the medical screening.

2. What if the majority of people visiting Country X are from Country A but these people visit country Y before visiting Country X. So, these people won't qualify in the group all visitors from Country Y and thus will be excluded from the medical screening.

Visitors from Country Y is different People who visited Country Y recently.

Are 1 and 2 correct strengtheners?
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Hi Skywalker18,

As others have mentioned, the fact that D is not true in real life is irrelevant, because the question asks "Which of the following, if true, ..."

This question is actually a "weaken" question, not a "strengthen" question. Your statements 1 and 2 would be correct weakeners, assuming that the argument is differentiating between "visitors from country Y" and "people traveling from country Y to country X", which is not necessarily a correct assumption. We would need to know more details about this from the argument.

Hope that helps
-Carolyn
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Because no one actually answered this question earlier: no, you could never expect to see this kind of answer on the actual GMAT. Real GMAT CR questions that have a basis in real life are always carefully researched. If the GMAT were to use a similar question setup, they would invent a new disease or condition about which the test taker could have no prior knowledge.

I can see what this question is trying to teach -- that you shouldn't bring outside knowledge to GMAT CR questions -- but it's doing that in a way you'll never see on the real test.

GMATNinja mikemcgarry VeritasKarishma Hi verbal experts, please help me understand where I am going wrong with my reasoning.



According to the question, I have to identify an answer choice that will say that even if we test ALL the visitors from Y, the spread of TC will not be stopped. In other words, TC will spread even after the proposed plan of testing all the visitors.


Now, if I go by option B, I can say that we won't be able to detect all the carriers of TC. This means, there might be a few people who would have TC and still enter country X. These people would add to the spreading of TC in country X.

In order for the plan to work we need to ensure that NO ONE with TC enters the country X. Because even if one person enters, we can't say that the spread has been curbed.


As for option D, how does it help if TC does not get spread through human contact. it could very well be transmitted from a TC-infected person to air / food and then affect more people in country X. How does D weaken the plan's outcome.

Hi saman283,

I think we should start by changing our target outcome. Verbal is (generally) not about yes/no choices. When the question says "which of the following, if true, most strongly suggests {ABC}", it is not asking us to guarantee that particular {ABC}, whatever it may be. Instead, we want the best option. It doesn't even have to be particularly convincing. It just has to be better than the other four options. In other words, try not to look for an option that guarantees that the spread of TC will not be stopped. Look for something that gets you closer to what the question stem says than the other options do.


Here's the question stem:

"Will not help curb" ~ "will not help reduce". The word help is particularly important here.


Let's go back to the fact that we are working with measures to help reduce (or help limit) the spread of TB. Again, focus on help. Imagine that you're in charge of selecting measures that will help reduce the spread of COVID-19 in your country. Would you not use medical tests just because no medical test is 100% effective? The point is that even if medical technology is not perfect, it is still possible to use medical examinations as part of a strategy to help reduce the spread of a disease.


If we had to choose measures to help limit the spread of a disease, when would we reject medical examinations of humans? Option B says that we should reject medical examinations of humans if the examinations cannot detect every single carrier of the disease. Option D says that we should reject medical examinations of humans if the disease doesn't spread through human contact.

That's the real choice here, and even though we could weaken D (the way you did), I'd say that D is better than B.
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Yes, I did not consider (D) to be a viable option. I assumed that "human contact" means "people coming in contact with infected people". Well then, there are many other ways a disease could travel - through leftover food/water/waste of infected humans into the food chain/ through mosquitoes etc.
I could not assume that they mean infected humans cannot pass it on to other humans in any way.

I was flipping between (B) and (C) and found them to be equally wrong. Both imply that we cannot detect and avoid "all" cases. That is alright. As long as the measure will help curb the spread, it's good enough. It may not completely stop the spread but it should help curb it.

Hence, I really had no answer here.

B states that the Current medical technology is not capable of detecting all carriers of tuberculosis. If this is the case, then the current technology might be able to detect some carriers and it would curb the spread.

D is more strong and portrays that a check of humans will not curb the spread.

Hope it helps

Regards
Manan Jain

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