The traditional treatment of strep infections - Strengthen

[Beatrice Michael]

The traditional treatment of strep infections has been a seven-day course of
antibiotics, either penicillin or erythromycin. However, since many patients stop
taking those drugs within three days, reinfection is common in cases where
those drugs are prescribed. A new antibiotic requires only a three-day course of
treatment. Therefore, reinfection will probably be less common in cases where
the new antibiotic is prescribed than in cases where either penicillin or
erythromycin is prescribed. Which of the following, if true, most
strengthens the argument?
A. Some of the people who are allergic to penicillin are likely to be allergic to the
new antibiotic.
B. A course of treatment with the new antibiotic costs about the same as a course
of treatment with either penicillin or erythromycin.
C. The new antibiotic has been shown to be effective in eradicating bacterial
infections other than strep.
D. Some physicians have already begun to prescribe the new antibiotic instead of
penicillin or erythromycin for the treatment of some strep infections.
E. Regardless of whether they take a traditional antibiotic or the new one, most
patients feel fully recovered after taking the drug for three days



The answer here is E

Strengthen question the assumptions identified are as follows



P or E is less effective in keeping the infection a w ay than the new one
- new drug is more effective than P or E
The new drug does not cause any more side effects


how is E relevant


Regardless of whether they take a traditional antibiotic or the new one, most patients feel fully recovered after taking the drug for three days.


here the question clearly mentions that P or E is less effective than the new drug then how can the usage of either be regardless.. and here the other part of the question addresses the fact that reinfection is common and so recovery in 3 days is possible on the nevv drug

can someone please explain this question has really confused me

what is the best way to approach strengthen questions then

[tim]

i think you have fundamentally misinterpreted the premises, and unfortunately this paragraph makes no sense at all to me:

"here the question clearly mentions that P or E is less effective than the new drug then how can the usage of either be regardless.. and here the other part of the question addresses the fact that reinfection is common and so recovery in 3 days is possible on the nevv drug"

can you please try again on this one? make sure you identify all the relevant premises, and if you still don't see why E is the best option, ask your questions again but please proofread your questions before sending them over so we can understand what you're asking..

[Beatrice Michael]

Tim

I am sure about this question.It is an earlier Gmat question

[tim]

you have not addressed any of my concerns, so we cannot help you any further at this point..

[shankar245]

Hello Mgmat experts ,

What I understand from the argument is as follows ( I did select E as the answer but as you all say the reasoning behind is more important than correct/ wrong answer)


Argument :

Traditional treatment 7 days treatment time
some patients stop within 3 days-> Chance of a re infection.

New treatment -> 3 days treatment time

Conclusion:
re infection will be less in the cases where the new treatment is applied rather than the old one.

How does E support/ Strengthen?
It says that irrespective of the Old /New treatment , the duration of the course is 3 days. This means that the new treatment is working and not causing any re infections.

If the new treatment had not worked , reinfection cases would have spiked up.

what I do not understand is this :

If a person takes the traditional antibiotic, how would he feel fully recovered as it takes 7 days for complete recovery!!

[abhey.seth]

Hi,

Let me try and answer your query.

Lets understand what the argument is saying?
The argument is saying that the new antibiotic takes 3 day course of treatment rather than 7 days taken by E or P.

Now, in order to determine whether the reinfection will occur we will have to show the effectiveness of this new antibiotic i.e. the new 3-day course antibiotic is as effective in fully recovering a patient as a 7-day course antibiotic (as it is already given that the patients do not tend to continue having antibiotics after 3 days). If this point is proved, then we can firmly say that the 3-day course antibiotic will reduce the chances of reinfection.

Here E does exactly that by saying patients feel fully recovered when they use either type of antibiotics in 3 days.

Hope it helps.

[jlucero]

I think the last two posts are little bit off from the missing assumption. Let me start with what's already been said:

Argument :
Traditional treatment 7 days treatment time
some patients stop within 3 days-> Chance of a re infection.

New treatment -> 3 days treatment time

Conclusion:
re infection will be less in the cases where the new treatment is applied rather than the old one.


Assumption:
people will be more likely to complete the entire treatment if it only takes 3 days

BUT, what if people will take the medicine for as long as it takes for them to feel better. What if with the traditional treatment, people don't feel better until day 6, but they stop taking the drugs because they think they are worthless.

(E) gives us a reason why people stop taking the traditional antibiotics (they already feel better) and gives us hope that people on this new antibiotic will have finished their entire treatment by the time they stop taking their antibiotics

[sachin.w]

thanks joe.. made things clear..

[tim]

glad to hear it..

[rohitowe99]

My interpretation was somewhat different.

E states that the no matter what course of medicine the patients take , they will feel fully recovered after taking the medication for 3 days.

Negating E: patients will feel fully recovered before 3 days. In that case, even if people take the new antibiotic, they might stop using it just after a day or two (when they feel recovered). Not completing the course of the new antibiotic will lead to the reinfection.

Thus using negation the argument is proved to be flawed.

Therefore E is the correct assumption.

[jlucero]

My interpretation was somewhat different.

E states that the no matter what course of medicine the patients take , they will feel fully recovered after taking the medication for 3 days.

Negating E: patients will feel fully recovered before 3 days. In that case, even if people take the new antibiotic, they might stop using it just after a day or two (when they feel recovered). Not completing the course of the new antibiotic will lead to the reinfection.

Thus using negation the argument is proved to be flawed.

Therefore E is the correct assumption.

Negation doesn't work as well when it comes to strengthen/weaken arguments. You're probably thinking of assumption questions, where an assumption is NECESSARY. S/W questions can bring us new information that helps/hurts an argument, but don't necessarily have to be true. So be careful when negating E.

Also, the negation of E wouldn't be that something happens faster. The opposite of people feeling better after 3 days is people NOT feeling better after 3 days. But this doesn't do much to hurt our argument and is a non sequitur.