These days, drug companies and health professionals alike

Question

These days, drug companies and health professionals alike are focusing their attention on cholesterol in the blood. The more cholesterol we have in our blood, the higher the risk that we shall die of a heart attack. The issue is pertinent since heart disease kills more North Americans every year than any other single cause. At least three factors - smoking, drinking and exercise - can each influence levels of cholesterol in the blood.

Which one of the following can be properly concluded from the passage?

Which one of the following can be properly concluded from the passage?

A) If a person has low blood cholesterol, then that person's risk of fatal heart disease is low. 
B) Smoking in moderation can entail as great a risk of fatal heart disease as does heavy smoking 
C) A high-cholesterol diet is the principal cause of death in North America 
D) The only way that smoking increases one's risk of fatal heart disease is by influencing the levels of cholesterol in the blood 
E) The risk of fatal disease can be altered by certain changes in lifestyle

Source: LSAT PrepTests

toshio86 · Accepted Answer

Answer should be E.

A) If a person has low blood cholesterol, then that person's risk of fatal heart disease is low.

The argument states that high cholesterol may increase the risk of fatal heart disease, but it does not say that if one's cholesterol is low then this risk is low. In fact, consider the case in which a person has low cholesterol, but has genetic predisposition towards heart diseases; he will still face a high risk of heart fatal disease. This case clearly contradicts A...thus A is out.

E) The risk of fatal disease can be altered by certain changes in lifestyle.

Correct. In mathematical terms: variable "cholesterol" influences the variable "risk of heart disease". Can "heart disease" be a fatal disease? Yes, since the argument says that many people are killed by this disease every year.
So cholesterol affects the risk of fatal disease.
Last, does lifestyle affect cholesterol? Yes, for example in terms of smoking, drinking, and exercise habits. Lifestyle affects the risk of fatal disease.
Thus E is correct.

onedayill · Answer

E

1. there might other reason exists for a person to have higher risk---eleminated 
2. just says smoking can influence ..no comment on how---eliminated 
3. No points that high-cholesterol food causes high cholesterol in blood--eliminated 
4. No information on smoking--eliminated 
5. this is the nearest hence I have chosen this

aadikamagic · Answer

a) If a person has low blood cholesterol, then that person's risk of fatal heart disease is low.  It cannot be assumed that the reverse condition will be true. 
b) Smoking in moderation can entail as great a risk of fatal heart disease as does heavy smoking. the text doesn't talk about type of smoking 
c)a high-cholesterol diet is the principal cause of death in North America. "Principal cause" is too generelized 
d) The only way that smoking increases one's risk of fatal heart disease is by influencing the levels of cholesterol in the blood. Smoking can have other effects too. 
e) the risk of fatal disease can be altered by certain changes in lifestyle. This should be correct as the passage is suggesting this.

Please state the OA

sobby · Answer

i was between A and E ..Selected E ....
For A i thought, the passage is specific about more chols. greater chnace of "heart attack" , n answer choice is taking a general case i'e fetal heart disease.there can be other heart disease that does not depend on chols level..so i rejected A

JS1290 · Answer

A is a trap answer in my opinion. Just because if a person has a "low blood cholesterol" doesn't really mean that he or she is ultimately safe. Their risk could be higher as well. The passage doesn't really state anything about "low blood cholesterol" and its correlation with heart disease. E hits the conclusion right in the head

kumarparitosh123 · Answer

Hello members,
I came down to A and E but I rejected E because I am not sure if we can consider heart disease as a subset of fatal disease.
I mean many other diseases can come under fatal disease. But the argument talks only about heart disease.

Kindly help and correct my reasoning.

Sent from my Lenovo TAB S8-50LC using  GMAT Club Forum mobile app

RussianWinters · Answer

Hi,

This is my approach (sharing because I got this question right well within 2 minutes). I try to choose an option which is LEAST WRONG, rather than a PERFECT ONE.

(A) Causal relationship is distorted. Yes, higher the cholesterol, higher the risk of disease. But there are N number of factors which can cause fatal disease EVEN IF cholesterol is ZERO. Therefore, based on the stimulus, we cannot say lower the cholesterol, lower the risk of fatal disease.

(B) Definitely wrong. Cannot deduce this based on the stimulus.

(C) High blood cholesterol is an issue, not high cholesterol diet.

(D) Definitely wrong. Cannot deduce this based on the stimulus.

(E) First things first. If heart disease kills people in NA, then it is fatal. To your second point --> Had it said, "The risk of fatal disease is DECREASED..", it would have been definitely wrong because we cannot deduce that from the question stem as heart disease is not the only fatal disease. However, based on the stimulus, we can definitely deduce that by making CERTAIN changes in the lifestyle (based on the 3 lifestyle factors mentioned in the stimulus), we can ALTER the risk. To help you imagine, let's assume someone is about to get mouth cancer because of tobacco and a heart disease because of smoking. And let's assume that lung cancer is more deadly. Even if this is the case, based on the stimulus, I can still say with confidence that risk of fatal disease can be ALTERED by CERTAIN changes in the lifestyle, without mentioning the nature of alteration.

Hope this explains.

bidskamikaze · Answer

Interesting question.

A) If a person has low blood cholesterol, then that person's risk of fatal heart disease is low. - Tricky. Notice the exact words used in the passage: The more cholesterol we have in our blood, the higher the risk that we shall DIE of a heart attack. North Americans are likely to DIE of a heart attack if they have high cholesterol. However, high/ low incidence of heart attack isn't specified as a result of high/ low cholesterol. B) Smoking in moderation can entail as great a risk of fatal heart disease as does heavy smoking - Moderate vs heavy smoking hasn't been discussed in the passage. C) A high-cholesterol diet is the principal cause of death in North America - This also cannot be inferred. Maybe high cholesterol diet must be coupled with smoking or drinking to entails definite risk of heart attack? we don't know. D) The only way that smoking increases one's risk of fatal heart disease is by influencing the levels of cholesterol in the blood - Cannot be inferred. E) The risk of fatal disease can be altered by certain changes in lifestyle - CORRECT. This can be inferred from the last line of passage. E is correct.

Ayushi0002 · Answer

A uses the common fallacy A --> B doesn't mean that not A --> not B. 
It could also be seen logically that there could be other reasons for heart disease to persist even if the person has low cholesterol, hence not true that low cholesterol will lead to low heart disease.

Adit_ · Answer

Any causation statement if one is finding it hard to interpret, write it down:

High cholesterol -> High risk of heart attack.

The converse is true like:
Low risk of heart attack --> low cholesterol.
Other relations cannot be definitely proved. 
In causation:
A -> B then
B' -> A'

yashsharma1 · Answer

There is another question where reverse causation is assumed to arrive at the correct answer choice.
https://gmatclub.com/forum/topic455765.html

In the above question, the passage says that Elion is generated only and only if capacity is exceeded. So capacity increase is the only reason of Elion being generated. But nowhere does it mention that if the capacity is exceeded, Elion will definitely be generated as a consequence.

But in this one, we have rejected option 1 because if we say high cholestrol increases the risk of heart disease, it does not mean that if cholestrol is low, the risk of disease is low. We did this because we don't know the existence of other factors that contribute to heart disease.

Can KarishmaB or any expert take out time to explain the difference between these 2 questions. Any help is much appreciated

guddo · Answer

These days, drug companies and health professionals alike are focusing their attention on cholesterol in the blood. The more cholesterol we have in our blood, the higher the risk that we shall die of a heart attack. The issue is pertinent since heart disease kills more North Americans every year than any other single cause. At least three factors - smoking, drinking and exercise - can each influence levels of cholesterol in the blood.

Which one of the following can be properly concluded from the passage?

Which one of the following can be properly concluded from the passage?

The passage says higher blood cholesterol means higher risk of dying from a heart attack, and that smoking, drinking, and exercise can each affect blood cholesterol.  So the main takeaway  is that  some lifestyle changes can affect the risk of fatal heart disease .

A) If a person has low blood cholesterol, then that person's risk of fatal heart disease is low.

This does not follow. The passage says more cholesterol means higher risk, but it does not say low cholesterol guarantees low risk.

B) Smoking in moderation can entail as great a risk of fatal heart disease as does heavy smoking

Nothing in the passage compares moderate smoking with heavy smoking.

C) A high-cholesterol diet is the principal cause of death in North America

The passage does not even discuss diet as a cause, and it says heart disease is the leading cause of death, not a high-cholesterol diet.

D) The only way that smoking increases one's risk of fatal heart disease is by influencing the levels of cholesterol in the blood

“Only way” is too strong. The passage says smoking can influence cholesterol, not that this is its only effect on heart-disease risk.

E) The risk of fatal disease can be altered by certain changes in lifestyle

This is supported. Since smoking, drinking, and exercise affect cholesterol, and cholesterol affects the risk of fatal heart attack, some lifestyle changes can alter that risk.

Answer: (E)

Adit_ · Answer

To all those that are looking for a proper reasoning as to why A is wrong:
When A leads to be B or A --> B
then NOT B --> NOT A
This converse is always true, BUT B --> A is not always true, may be true depending on context, and in CR question like these the options are must be true statement which can be concluded thus A is false as it says NOT A --> NOT B but it must be NOT B --> NOT A for it to be true.

KarishmaB · Answer

Given:  If and only if the maximum pumping rate of a rig's machinery is exceeded, will Elion be released into the surrounding water...

"If and only if" means sufficient and necessary. So if max pumping rate is exceeded, Elion is definitely released.

"The more cholesterol we have in our blood, the higher the risk that we shall die of a heart attack."

This means that if A's level of cholesterol increases, it increases his risk of developing fatal heart disease. Say at low cholesterol, A's risk is 2% and at high it is 5%. 
It does not mean that a person with low cholesterol has objectively low risk. It is possible that because of some other factors he may still have high risk. Just that a high cholesterol will increase the risk even more. The argument is comparing the person's risk with high cholesterol with the person's own risk with low cholesterol. Rest all variables are controlled.

These days, drug companies and health professionals alike

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