Q7 - The number of hospital emergency room ...

[ottoman]

This question asks for a sufficient assumption. C bridges the gap.
I am wondering whether E can be an answer for a question asks for a necessary assumption.

Thank you so much!

[ohthatpatrick]

Hmmm, I think it's close to something that feels like a Necessary Assumption, but I don't think it's actually Necessary.

After all, if we negated it said that heroin users don't always identify themselves as such when they come to emergency rooms, would that really RUIN the author's argument?

Not really. I'm guessing you were thinking, "How can we trust that the number really grew by 25% if we don't know how many people were secretly heroin users but didn't reveal so?"

There are a couple problems with that:
1. The negation here would suggest that the number of heroin users visiting emergency rooms really grew by MORE than 25%. If some users didn't identify themselves as such, then the number of heroin users is HIGHER than what we thought. That doesn't hurt the conclusion, it strengthens it!

2. This is really trying to attack the premise, not the conclusion. Even though Necessary Assumptions are technically about "the argument", you mainly see correct answers that, if negated, go against the conclusion or keep the premise from reaching the conclusion.

I think if this were a Necessary Assumption question, you'd see LSAT thinking this way:

Great, we have to accept that the number of H-users visiting emergency rooms went up 25%. But do we have to believe the reason for that is because there are more H-users?

What are some alternative explanations that could explain the statistical uptick with the SAME number of H-users?

Maybe new hospitals opened in areas near heroin users. If that were so, you'd see more heroin-related hospital visits even though the population of heroin users was constant.

Maybe hospitals started offering heroin users incentives to come in, such as clean needles. That would cause more emergency room visits, even though the population of heroin users was constant.

So a Necessary Assumption answer for this would almost always take one of those alternative explanations and RULE IT OUT.

for example,
(A) Since 1980, it is not the case that many new hospitals have opened in areas where heroin use is prevalent and where there were no previously hospitals.

or

(A) Hospitals did not institute a policy after 1980 of giving away free needles to heroin users who come to the emergency room.

Hope this helps.

[WaltGrace1983]

I was also thinking about this question and how it can be turned into something else.

"The number of hospital emergency room visits by h-users grew by 25% in the 1980s. Thus, the number of h-users rose in that decade."

Wouldn't THIS make (E) sufficient? IF there were more heroin users going to the hospitals (and heroin users identify themselves as such when they come to the hospital) THEN the number of heroin users rose.

Well I guess we might also have to assume that it wasn't the same people checking in though. Not sure.

Anyway, I also thought that (E) was a particularly odd answer choice. (A) is quickly ruled out because it doesn't matter when they go to see medical care, (B) is ruled out because it might actually weaken the argument by providing an opportunity for the same people to go over and over and over again, and (D) because we really don't care about methods of heroin intake and how they have changed. That is irrelevant.

EDIT: also, isn't the original post kind of irrelevant because we are just talking about the USE of heroin going up, not exactly the USERS of heroin which are two totally different things. Use can go up without users going up and Users can go up without use going up.