Given a paragraph, generate a claim that is supported by the given paragraph. 1) The claim must contain information from within the paragraph. 2) A sentence within the paragraph can be used as a claim. 3) The claim should not have contradictions within the paragraph. 4) The claim should be at most one sentence long.

Ex Input:
Health Secretary Lorenzo González said Saturday that officials discovered a cache of urgently needed personal protective equipment at a hospital in the nearby island of Vieques that remains closed since the Category 4 storm hit the U.S. territory in September 2017. He said the equipment includes face masks, gloves, gowns and face shields that were in good condition and would be distributed to health institutions. “They’re very useful at this moment,” said González, who became the island’s newest health secretary this week, the third in the span of two weeks. He also said officials recently located a warehouse with medicine and medical equipment worth $4 million donated during Hurricane Maria, and that nearly all of it had expired. He did not provide details about what specific items were found. Puerto Rico has reported 18 deaths related to COVID-19, including that of a nurse, and more than 450 confirmed cases, including several police officers who join health workers in demanding more personal protective equipment. “Police are going the extra mile right now, and the government is not protecting us like it should,” said Gregorio Matías, vice president of a police union. The discovery in Vieques outraged many on an island still struggling to recover from Maria and from a series of strong earthquakes that hit Puerto Rico’s southern region in recent months. González said he has ordered an investigation into why those supplies were abandoned in Vieques. The announcement comes two months after a group of Puerto Ricans discovered and broke into a warehouse filled with emergency supplies in southern Puerto Rico at a time local officials sought urgent help for those affected by a string of earthquakes. Other similar discoveries have been made since Maria hit. González said the government still needs other equipment including testing kits and ventilators, noting that there are only 500 available for an island of 3.2 million people with high rates of asthma. “If that’s going to be the difference between life and death, people are going to die,” he said. “Don’t take this lightly.” A doctor who leads a COVID-19 government task force has said the U.S. territory needs at least 3,000 ventilators with the anticipated peak in cases expected in early May. Puerto Rico is in the middle of a month long curfew that is one of the strictest in any U.S. jurisdiction and has shuttered non-essential businesses and banned people from going outside unless they have to buy food, medicine or go to the bank.

Ex Output:
Puerto Rico discovers protective supply cache amid COVID-19.


Ex Input:
Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar and Surgeon General Jerome Adams made the announcement, with Azar calling marijuana “a dangerous drug.” Officials said President Donald Trump has donated $100,000 — one-quarter of his annual government salary — toward a digital campaign to raise awareness of the risks. Trump has forgone his official salary since taking office. The warning comes as legal marijuana has grown into a $10-billion industry in the U.S. with nearly two-thirds of states legalizing it, mainly for medical uses. Possessing small amounts of marijuana for adult recreational use is legal in 11 states and the District of Columbia, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. The list includes California, Colorado, Michigan and Maine. Federal law still treats it as a controlled substance akin to opioids. Adams said science shows that marijuana is harmful to the developing brains of teenagers and to the human fetus. The drug has also gotten stronger, with a three-fold increase in the concentration of the active ingredient THC in cultivated plants over the last 20 years. “This ain’t your mother’s marijuana,” Adams said. The American Medical Association said it strongly supports the government’s effort, adding that it for some time it has been recommending against marijuana use by teens, pregnant women and women who are breastfeeding. The surgeon general said his advisory is a direct result of scientific research that runs counter to changing social mores. “Marijuana use is a risk to the developing brain,” Adams said. “Over time there has been a change in attitudes about marijuana creating a false sense of security.” While the White House has made the opioid epidemic a top policy and political priority, marijuana previously had not gotten such high-level attention. Federal officials say they fear the trend toward legalization may make it more enticing for teenagers to try marijuana. It’s a commonly used drug among youths, they said, along with alcohol and e-cigarettes. No states allow recreational marijuana use by teens. States with medical marijuana programs, Illinois among them, generally allow use by minors with consent from a legal guardian and certification from a doctor. Adams said that for teens it carries a risk of affecting brain development, which continues in the 20s. Frequent marijuana use by teenagers is associated with changes in parts of the brain that are involved with attention, memory, decision-making and motivation. Among pregnant women, marijuana is the most commonly used illicit drug, with about 7% reporting they had used it within the past month in a 2017 study. Some women use it to help with morning sickness. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the American Academy of Pediatrics advise women not to use marijuana during pregnancy, and to discontinue the drug if they find out they are pregnant. HHS Assistant Secretary for Health Brett Giroir said pregnant women taking marijuana to relieve morning sickness should stop. “If you have morning sickness, talk to your physician,” said Giroir. “There are FDA-approved drugs to help with morning sickness. Taking marijuana for morning sickness has never been shown to be safe and effective.” The government’s National Institute on Drug Abuse is paying for several studies on marijuana use in pregnancy, including one involving women who have chosen to continue using the drug to treat morning sickness despite warnings. While some studies have suggested that marijuana may be harmful to the developing brain, the evidence isn’t conclusive, explained NIDA Director Nora Volkow, who said she strongly supports the surgeon general’s warning. “We cannot close our eyes and say this is not happening. It’s happening,” said Volkow. It would be a missed opportunity not to continue the research to find conclusive evidence on how the drug affects the fetus, she said. “My view is that the way that you change things is by providing evidence,” she added. ___ Associated Press Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner in Chicago contributed to this article.

Ex Output:
‘This ain’t your mother’s marijuana,’ surgeon general says.


Ex Input:
Good job on this. The story stated: However, it could have also included at least a line about the costs of following testing and possible treatment of false positives. Excellent. The story put the important number needed to screen in the third sentence of the story:  “A major government study found the screening scans saved the life of one person for every 300 current or former smokers who were scanned.”  It went on to explain “The study was stopped when it was found that the scanning group had a 20 percent lower risk of dying from lung cancer than those being screened with X-rays.” It could have done so in absolute terms, not relative risk reduction, but overall it warrants a satisfactory score. The story was clear on this: In a rarity for such a story, “downsides” was even in the headline. The third paragraph read:  “But now cancer and screening experts are worried that the limited findings will be used by private screening centers to promote the test to a broader group than was studied. That, in turn, could lead to thousands of unnecessary lung scans, causing excess radiation exposure and unnecessary biopsies and surgery.” In clear language, the article explained key points about the study, including its limitations: While the study found a benefit to scanning a specific group of high-risk smokers, that doesn’t mean other groups will get the same benefit. Good job here as well. The quote from Dr. Otis Brawley of the American Cancer Society was key:  “To take a trial that involves people at high risk for lung cancer and to extrapolate it and say it’s good for people with intermediate or low risk is not appropriate.”  Good sourcing – including quotes from one who promotes the scans and the study findings and from two who have concerns and are skeptical or worried about the impact. The one comparison was the synopsis of the key study finding: “The smokers and former smokers were given either annual CT lung scans or chest X-rays. Compared with conventional X-rays, the CT, or computed tomography, scans create a detailed three-dimensional image of the lungs. The study was stopped when it was found that the scanning group had a 20 percent lower risk of dying from lung cancer than those being screened with X-rays.” The availability of CT scanners to do lung cancer screening was clear from the story. More importantly, though, was the question of interpreting those scans – with questions raised in this excerpt about the problems even experienced radiologists at major cancer centers had: The story explained that some were already promoting the study’s findings in news releases saying that the study “should once and for all settle the controversy” about whether CT lung scans save lives. But it quickly countered that claim with observations from Dr. Otis Brawley of the American Cancer Society who said that he was worried that the few early press releases and radio advertisements are just the beginning of widespread promotion of screening lung scans. “It was sort of ominous to be working Sunday evening in my home office and this thing comes on the radio,” he said. “A lot of people run out when there is a new announcement and get the new test. We’re very frightened some people are going to be harmed because of this.”  This column did not rely on a news release.

Ex Output:

The Downside of a Cancer Study Extolling CT Scans