June 1993 LSAT Section 1 Question 13

Five years ago, during the first North American outbreak of the cattle disease CXC, the death rate from the disease w...

CassidyG on May 11, 2022

why is d right

the death rate was 5% years ago but today the death rate is 18%. How does D weaken the statement when it is just talking about mild cases where there is no death reported.

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Emil-Kunkin on May 16, 2022

Hi CassidyG,

The flaw in this argument hinges on the word "reported." We are told that 5 years ago 5% of reported cases resulted in death, but today 18% of reported cases end in death. The argument then concludes that the disease has become more deadly. However, the argument draws that conclusion on the basis of only partial data- sure some cases are not being reported. Let's imagine that 5 years ago there were 100 reported cases, and 5 deaths leaving a death rate of 5%. Today, however, farmers have stopped reporting the mild cases, and only report 25 severe cases, with 5 deaths, leading to a reported death rate of 20%. However, the disease did not become more deadly, rather farmers are underreporting the number of total cases making the death rate appear higher than it actually is.