It is difficult to find the precise causes of any disease

Question

It is difficult to find the precise causes of any disease resulting from B-Vitamin deficiencies. For example, it was known that being deficient in all the B-vitamins was sufficient to contract the disease beriberi, and also that beriberi was always accompanied by a deficiency of vitamin B1. However, recent human volunteers on special diets designed to lack only vitamin B1, did not contract the disease.

Which of the following if true best explains the results above?

A) Individuals whose diets lack vitamin B1 will contract beriberi only if they have a generally unhealthy diet.
B) A deficiency in vitamin B1 is not necessary to contract beriberi.
C) Beriberi can be cured by any variety of B-vitamin supplments
D) Berberi is caused by deficiencies in a combination of B-vitamins
E) Deficiencies in the B-vitamins have widely varying effects on different individuals, so that specific diseases cannot be adequately identified.

gamjatang · Answer

I switch over to (D), too. :oops:

ranga41 · Answer

D it is..

The only thing we know is deficiency of B1 alone does not cause Beriberi, but we have no details about the B1 levels on people who contacted beriberi so B is rejected..

an_narang · Answer

I would go for B...

In D - Combination of B vitamins doesn't mean that all of B vitamins. so D is rejected.

jdtomatito · Answer

The answer is D, 

"being deficient in all the B-vitamins was sufficient to contract the disease beriberi" thus, the disease is caused by "deficiencies in a combination of B-vitamins" as D states. Besides Beriberi is always accompanied by a deficiency of B1 (it is necessary). B is out

GMATT73 · Answer

The stem asks us to focus on the  results , hence B.

jdtomatito · Answer

The stem says that a deficiency of B1 is not sufficient, but we do not have enough information to assert that it is not necessary.

Jedi Master · Answer

B. B1 deficiency always led to beriberi, but this has been proven wrong by the results...... the results only refer to lack of B1. there are no results for other B vitamins. logically one should go with what strengthens the result

automan · Answer

IMO the correct answer is D. Why? It is stated that a deficiency in all the B-Vitamins is sufficient to contract beriberi. So a deficiency in B1 is necessary but not suffient. This is why I dismiss B.

OA plz

HIMALAYA · Answer

probably, i should change the answer to D, which seems more plausiable over B. sorry guys...

Antmavel · Answer

clear D for me

B1 is not representative of all B vitamins. Maybe B1 doesn't even play any role in the disease.

Chembeti · Answer

OA is D (from Kaplan)

OE is:

Answer choice (D) matches this prediction. If you need to be deficient in several B-vitamins in order to contract beriberi, it makes sense that the people in the study who didn’t take in any B1 did not contract beriberi – they were still getting plenty of the other B vitamins.

Choice (A) can’t be correct because it talks about “some” individuals, which is much too vague.

Choice (B) does nothing to help explain these strange results. It could very well be that vitamin B1 is necessary to cause beriberi. (That’s not the same thing as saying that it does cause the disease – remember, there could be other necessary factors as well.) Saying that B1 is necessary to cause beriberi does not explain why these people did not contract the illness – if anything, it deepens the mystery as to why they didn’t.

Choice (C) is out of scope – we don’t care what cures beriberi. (Not at the moment, anyway.)

And choice (E) does not specifically address this particular experiment and its originally confusing results.

It is difficult to find the precise causes of any disease

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