rohan2345 wrote:
SARS epidemic witnessed deaths of about 3,500 Physicians who had treated SARS patients and about 3,670 Physicians who had not engaged in treatment of SARS patients. On the basis of those figures, it can be concluded that it was not much more dangerous to participate in SARS treatment during the SARS epidemic than it was not to participate in SARS treatment.
Which of the following would reveal most clearly the absurdity of the conclusion drawn above?
A. Counting deaths among Physicians who had participated in SARS treatment in addition to deaths among Physicians who had not participated in SARS treatment
B. Expressing the difference between the numbers of deaths among Physicians who had treated SARS patients and Physicians who had not treated SARS patients as a percentage of the total number of deaths
C. Separating deaths caused by accidents during the treatment to SARS patients from deaths caused by infection while treating SARS patients.
D. Comparing death rates per thousand members of each group rather than comparing total numbers of deaths
E. Comparing deaths caused by accidents in the world to deaths caused by infection while treating SARS patients.
Analysis :The Argument has mentioned physician's death count from 2 groups. Now, we clearly donot know what those two groups/sets of physicians consisted. We also donot know the groups characteristics in any form. Now, based of the mare numbers, the argument concludes that the threat was similar to both the groups. Lets say a huge university,X, have 10 courses and each course is participated by 50 students . 1 of the course being MBA. Hence there are 50 MBA students in that university . Now say, there is an organization ,Y, that offers only an online MBA course that offers 48 seats . All of the seats are taken. Now when we want to conclude about 'the student participation in a MBA course' of X & Y - we definitely cannot
say that its approximately the same in X & Y. As in case of X: 50 out 500 participated. While in case of Y 45 out of 45 participated.
Option A: Incorrect : Exact rephrasing of argument. We already have the numbers.
Option B: Incorrect : The difference will not present the percentage impacted in each group.
Option C: Incorrect : Accident !!........ nowhere related to our point of discussion.
Option D: Correct : This would be the %tage representation of each group. And thus will help to get a idea of the danger associated in participation.
Say case 01 : 7000 Physicians participated and 3,500 died. 50% & 36700 did not participated and 3,670 died ==>10%
Say case 02 : 7000 Physicians participated and 3,500 died. 50% & 7500 did not participated and 3,670 died ==>aprox 49%
So clearly in the 1st case we can say that participation was dangerous , while in the 2nd case it is not.
Option E: Incorrect : Similar issue as in C. Accident !!........ nowhere related to our point of discussion.