TASK DEFINITION: Given a paragraph and a claim, classify it this way: If the claim contradicts the evidence present in the paragraph, classify the claim as '0'. If the claim has multiple supporting *AND* contradicting evidences, classify the claim as '1'. If the claim has supporting evidence and the paragraph is in overall favor of the claim, then classify the claim as '2'.
PROBLEM: Paragraph: Publishing a study that found risk score tools are only around 46 percent accurate on how likely psychopathic convicts are to kill, rape or assault again, they said probation officers and judges should set little or no store by such tests. They warned that clinicians carrying out such classifications must be aware of their severe limitations, and make sure prisoners undergo comprehensive psychiatric diagnosis before any risks assessment is made. “If you apply these (tests) to somebody who is a psychopath, they’re utterly useless, you might as well toss a coin,” said Jeremy Coid, director of the forensic psychiatry research unit at Queen Mary University of London who led the study. “They will not predict accurately at all,” he told reporters at a briefing in London about his findings. Coid and other forensic psychiatrists say the findings - which also showed the tools perform only moderately well in prisoners with disorders like schizophrenia, depression, drug and alcohol dependence - could have major implications for risk assessment in criminal justice systems. “There are increasing expectations of public protection from violent behavior, and psychiatrists can be seriously criticized if they make wrong decisions,” he said. Seena Fazel, a consultant forensic psychiatrist at Britain’s University of Oxford, said the reliability of the tests’ predictive ability was so low that it might be best not to use them at all - and warned that at the very least, their results should only be noted by parole boards, rather than acted upon. “If you’re going to use these instruments, be aware of their strengths and limitations,” he told reporters. The estimated prevalence of adult psychopathy in the general population is around 1 percent, but that rises to between 15 percent and 25 percent among men in prison. Coid, whose study was published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, analyzed data from 1,396 male prisoners in England and Wales who were interviewed between six and 12 months before their release. All the men were serving sentences of two or more years for a sexual or violent offences. The prisoners were assessed for personality disorders, symptoms of schizophrenia, depression and drug and alcohol dependence, as well as being measured for psychopathy on a reputable scale known as Hare Psychopathy Check List. After their release, data on their re-offending rates was added to the study, and showed that among three different re-offending risk assessment tools used before their release, the accuracy among psychopaths was below 50 percent. While the tools were more accurate in predictions for prisoners with no mental health disorders - at around 75 percent accuracy - they were only around 60 percent right when it came to prisoners diagnosed with schizophrenia and depression. For prisoners with anti-social personality disorders the predictive value of the tests ranged from poor to little more than chance, with an average 53.2 percent predictive accuracy. And for the 70 prisoners rated as psychopathic, none of the tests was statistically better than chance. Coid said the results suggest it is time to question the expectations put on psychiatrists and psychologists asked to forecast future behavior of offenders, and to consider what can happen to their reputations if predictions are wrong. “The easy solution is to be highly restrictive on who is released, and be risk averse. However, even for serious offenders, most will be released at some stage and someone has to carry out a risk assessment,” he said. “We need to prioritize the development of new assessment tools for these hard-to-predict groups.” Claim: Predicting violence in psychopaths is 'no more than chance'.

SOLUTION: 2

PROBLEM: Paragraph: "Del. Steve Landes says Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s long-sought initiative to expand Medicaid in Virginia is financial quicksand. ""Do you support or oppose Medicaid expansion in Virginia?"" Landes, R-Augusta, asked constituents in a recent survey about issues. ""While expansion would enroll up to 400,000 currently uninsured Virginians in Medicaid, it could cost the Commonwealth of Virginia over $1 billion per year, forcing cuts to other key services like education, mental health and public safety."" Landes is hardly the first Republican to sound the $1 billion-a-year alarm about the potential cost of expanding Medicaid. Others, including House Speaker Bill Howell, also have tossed around the number during the GOP’s successful three-year effort to block expansion. Democrats say the state has a moral obligation to make Medicaid available to all low-income Virginians who are qualified - particularly because the federal government has agreed to pay for the vast majority of the expansion. Republicans counter that Medicaid already is unwieldy and that Uncle Sam, deeply in debt, can’t be relied upon to pay his promised share. The issue is certain to re-emerge this winter when the General Assembly convenes for a 60-day session starting Jan. 13. So it’s a good time to look into the accuracy of the $1 billion-a-year claim. Let’s start with some background. The costs Under the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, states have the choice of extending their Medicaid programs to people who earn 138 percent of the U.S. poverty level. The federal government pays all of the expansion costs through this federal fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30, and gradually will drop its future share to a standing 90 percent after 2019. To date, 31 states have decided to expand Medicaid. Virginia’s Medicaid program is run by the state Department of Medical Assistance Services which, in September, issued annual cost estimates for Medicaid expansion through 2022. They show the expansion would cost a total of $800 million in fiscal 2017, with the state shouldering $32 million of that amount. In 2022, the cost would be $3.1 billion, with the state responsible for $325 million. But these gross figures don’t take into account savings that DMAS says the state would realize by expanding Medicaid. For example, Virginia now covers all the costs of hospitalizing a state prisoner; under Medicaid expansion, the federal government would pay 90 percent of the bills. Virginia pays most of the costs for uninsured low-income residents who receive behavioral health treatment from community service boards; under Medicaid expansion, the federal government again would pay 90 percent of those bills. DMAS concluded that the savings would outweigh the costs of Medicaid expansion through 2020, when Virginia would see a $34 million net gain from joining the program. After that, there would be some - but not much - red ink. DMAS estimated that the bottom-line cost to expand would be $3 million in 2022. Landes’ figure So how does Landes reach his estimate of a potential $1 billion-a-year cost to Virginia taxpayers? His calculation rests on the premise that the federal government, already over-committed, will renege on its legal promise to never pay less than 90 percent of expansion costs. ""If the federal government cut the expansion match rate back to 50/50, it would cost Virginia over $1 billion per year in the out years,"" Landes wrote to us in an email. He pointed out that the bottom-line price of expansion - combining Washington’s share with the state’s net cost - is estimated to exceed $2 billion a year starting in 2018. If the federal government tosses half of the expense back to Virginia that year or later, the state would be shackled with annual bills of at least $1 billion. Craig Markva, a spokesman for DMAS, told us the state has every reason to believe that won’t happen. For one thing, legislation would be required to cut the federal contribution. Edwin Park, the vice president for health policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal think tank, told us there’s no movement afoot in Congress to take such an action. In 2012, the Obama administration proposed a budget-cutting measure that would have changed the formula for how much it pays for Medicaid patients, boosting the federal match for current enrollees and lowering the match for people who became newly insured under the law. But after the Supreme Court ruled in 2012 that expansion was an option, not a mandate, the White House dropped that proposal, because it wanted to assure states the match would stay at 90 percent, Park said. It also should be noted that the Obama administration notified states in December 2012 that if they enrolled in expansion, they could drop out of the program at any time. That assurance was repeated in a March 20, 2014 letter that Cindy Mann, then the White House’s top Medicaid official, wrote to Bill Hazel, Virginia’s secretary of health. McAuliffe, a Democrat who has been pushing to broaden Medicaid, has proposed a state law that would require Virginia’s withdrawal if Washington reduced support for expansion. Republicans have been skeptical the state could extricate itself from the expansion once it began. Our ruling Landes, in a constituent survey, said Medicaid expansion ""could cost the Commonwealth of Virginia over $1 billion per year."" That contradicts the latest estimates on expansion. Virginia’s gross cost in 2022 - the furthest out the projections go - would be $324 million. The net cost, after taking into account a variety of savings the expansion offers, would be $3.1 million. That’s light years away from Landes’ figure. Landes’ estimate rests on the eye-popping supposition that the federal government could decide in the future to cut nearly half of its commitment to pay 90 percent of the costs for expansion, leaving states holding the bag. But this is pure speculation of his part. There’s no effort in Congress now to cut the federal share at all, let alone by the proportion Landes suggests. There’s a burden on Landes to prove his statement with facts, and he comes up short." Claim: "Medicaid expansion ""could cost the Commonwealth of Virginia over $1 billion a year..."

SOLUTION: 0

PROBLEM: Paragraph: On 3 October 2018, the  National Council of Churches (NCC) umbrella organization, a large consortium of Christian churches around the United States, issued a statement calling for the withdrawal of the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the United States Supreme Court. The NCC represents over 100,000 local congregations and 40 million churchgoers. Their statement was posted to the organization’s official Facebook page and read as follows: The National Council of Churches (NCC) calls for the withdrawal of the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court of the United States. We believe he has disqualified himself from this lifetime appointment and must step aside immediately. We note several reasons. During his appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Judge Kavanaugh exhibited extreme partisan bias and disrespect towards certain members of the committee and thereby demonstrated that he possesses neither the temperament nor the character essential for a member of the highest court in our nation. We are deeply disturbed by the multiple allegations of sexual assault and call for a full and unhindered investigation of these accusations. In addition, his testimony before the Judiciary Committee included several misstatements and some outright falsehoods. All citizens must be expected to speak truthfully when under oath, however, this is especially true for anyone who seeks a seat on the Supreme Court. Moreover, Judge Kavanaugh’s extensive judicial and political record is troubling with regard to issues of voting rights, racial and gender justice, health care, the rights of people with disabilities, and environmental protections. This leads us to believe that he cannot be an impartial justice in cases that are sure to come before him at the Court. Therefore the National Council of Churches calls for the withdrawal of Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court immediately. NCC was the second prominent religious organization to call for Kavanaugh’s nomination to be withdrawn. On 27 September 2018, America, the flagship publication for the Jesuit order within the Roman Catholic Church, published an editorial that concluded: “For the good of the country and the future credibility of the Supreme Court in a world that is finally learning to take reports of harassment, assault and abuse seriously, it is time to find a nominee whose confirmation will not repudiate that lesson.” Claim: At least 100,000 churches called for the withdrawal of Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court nomination.

SOLUTION:
1