Generate an explanation for the given claim using the provided supporting material from the paragraph. Please consider the following points while generating an output. 1) The claim will always have supporting proof in the paragraph, and the paragraph will have a clear point of view supporting the claim. 2) There can be instances where direct correlation to the claim is not available. Make use of the sentences in the paragraph to provide a corresponding output supporting the claim. 3) The explanation should be at least one and at most twelve sentences long.

Input: Consider Input: Paragraph: More than 132,000 cases of the virus have been reported in 123 countries since it emerged in December in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a virtual news conference. “Europe has now become the epicenter of the pandemic with more reported cases and deaths than the rest of world combined apart from China,” he said in Geneva. Tedros announced that the WHO was launching a coronavirus Solidarity Response Fund. This would to allow people and organizations to contribute to help fund masks, gloves, gowns and goggles for heath workers, as well as diagnostic kits and investment in research and development, including for vaccines. Facebook will match up to $10 million in donations, while Alphabet Inc’s Google will donate $5 million, the WHO and UN Foundation later announced in a joint statement. Social distancing, where people avoid close proximity or touching, is a “tried and tested method” to slow the spread of a virus but “not a panacea” that will stop transmission, the WHO’s top emergency expert Dr. Mike Ryan said. Each country must decide on its own measures to protect its population, he said, adding: “But we’ve also consistently said that blanket travel measures in their own right will do nothing to protect an individual state.”  Detection and isolation of infected people, as well as tracing their contacts and wider testing, must be part of a comprehensive strategy, Ryan said. “As part of an overall comprehensive strategy, there is a place - particularly inside national borders - for potentially restricting movement between zones, as we’ve seen in certain places,” he said. “But there is rarely a justification for blanket bans, unless of course the context and the risk defines that.”  U.S. President Donald Trump has announced sweeping travel restrictions to prevent people from 26 European countries - except for Britain and Ireland - from traveling to the United States in a bid to limit the virus spread. A number of other countries in recent days have announced stepped up border checks, and canceled flights to other countries, in an effort to contain the spread. Trump on Friday declared a national emergency over the fast-spreading coronavirus, opening the door to providing what he said was about $50 billion in federal aid to fight the disease. Claim: Europe is epicenter of coronavirus pandemic: WHO.

Output: Europe has now become the epicenter of a coronavirus pandemic that has claimed 5,000 lives around the world, “a tragic milestone”, the World Health Organization said on Friday.


Input: Consider Input: Paragraph: Citing states’ rights, jobs and the right to bear arms, congressional Republicans are reversing dozens of Obama-era rules affecting the environment, education and the energy sector. The GOP is using a largely unknown but highly effective legislative tool that allows a simple majority in the House and Senate to overturn regulations that often took years to craft. Indeed, with an overhaul of health insurance going off the rails, Republicans are left pointing to the repeal of various government regulations as their crowning legislative achievement after some 70 days at work. The GOP casts the effort as overturning eight years of excessive government regulation and boosting business. “These things will help get people back to work, and after years of sluggish growth, give a real boost to our economy,” Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., said this past week. The president has signed eight resolutions revoking regulations issued during the final months of Democrat Barack Obama’s presidency. Six resolutions have cleared Congress and are awaiting the president’s signature. A couple dozen more are on deck, with last Thursday the deadline for filing more. Trump has signed measures eliminating requirements that mining and oil companies report payments made to foreign governments. The rule was designed to shine a light on how much money foreign governments received for their nation’s resources, thus reducing the prospect of corruption. He also signed another measure reversing an Obama plan to prevent coal mining debris from being dumped into nearby streams. “These actions from Congress and the president are giving hope to businesses that they haven’t had in a long time,” said Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi scoffed at the notion that Republicans were accomplishing anything with the regulatory repeals “because they do not meet the needs of the American people.” “They are about trickle-down. Their life is about giving more money to the high-end and to corporate interests, maybe it will trickle down, that would be good, but if it doesn’t, so be it, that’s the free market,” Pelosi said. Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy group, said the regulatory repeals Congress pushed through will actually damage the economy more than it helps. He said that eliminating the stream protection rule may help coal companies, but it hurts other companies that stand to gain through healthier streams and water supplies. “If you look across the terrain of the Congressional Review Act resolutions, they are repeals of public measures that help, consumers, workers and the environment in very substantial ways, but are opposed by powerful corporate interests,” Weissman said. “The Republicans driving these measures are paying back their corporate benefactors at the expense of the public.” In some cases, the regulatory repeal efforts have had nothing to do with the economy, but addressed hot-button social issues that so often dominate Washington politics. Republicans blocked a Social Security Administration rule that would have prevented tens of thousands of mentally disabled beneficiaries from being able to purchase a firearm. The rule was targeted specifically at those beneficiaries with mental disorders who have a third party manage their financial benefits, and it was opposed by the NRA and several advocacy groups for the disabled. The latest repeal effort clearing both chambers required Republicans to bring Vice President Mike Pence to the Capitol so he could cast the tie-breaking vote on the abortion issue. The scrapping of the Health and Human Services rule gave states the go-ahead to deny federal family planning money to Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers. One of the more closely contested repeals would kill an online privacy regulation. Fifteen Republicans sided with Democrats in opposing the repeal, which Pelosi said would allow internet providers to sell personal information without a user’s consent. “You should be very, very scared,” she said. The ability of Congress to void regulations with a simple majority was created in 1996 when Congress passed the Congressional Review Act. In the 20 years since, Congress was only able to use it once to repeal a regulation. Congress sent five repeal resolutions to Obama, but he vetoed each of them. Trump made clear early on that he would back the efforts of the GOP-led Congress. “I will keep working with Congress, with every agency, and most importantly with the American people until we eliminate every unnecessary, harmful and job-killing regulation that we can find,” Trump said this past week. “We have a lot more coming.” The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has encouraged the regulatory rollbacks, weighing in with lawmakers on efforts affecting internet providers, federal contractors and energy companies. Neil Bradley, a senior vice president at the Chamber, acknowledges that it’s hard to say how many jobs are created or saved through the repeal of one particular rule, but he says employers of all sizes tell the chamber government regulations are a top concern that makes it harder for them to flourish. “Any time we can roll back these regulations is another step forward to restoring the economic growth that I think is the top priority of the American people,” Bradley said. ____ On Twitter, reach Kevin Freking at https://twitter.com/APkfreking Claim: GOP Congress rolls back rules on hunting, broadband privacy.

Output: Hunters could soon target grizzly bears from the air on Alaska’s federal lands. Internet providers may get to sell the browsing habits of their customers. States will be able to deny federal family planning money to Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers.


Input: Consider Input: Paragraph: The broadcast explains that the cost of implanting a stent runs between “15 to 25 thousand bucks,” and suggests that the procedure is not cost-effective in about half of those currently considered candidates. The broadcast summarizes the trial’s results in general terms but does not report the actual number or percentage of heart attacks and deaths (the trial’s primary outcome). Over the course of follow-up, there were 211 deaths and nonfatal heart attacks in the group receiving stents plus optimal medical therapy, and 202 such events among patients receiving optimal medical therapy alone. After 4.6 years, the cumulative event rates in the two groups were 19% and 18.5%, respectively—nonsignificant differences. The broadcast does not mention potential harms of medical therapy or stenting. This information was also omitted from the trial’s published manuscript. What should a patient know about complications and other side effects associated with these treatments? A sentence summarizing harms reported in previous studies would have been helpful. The broadcast describes a large, randomized, controlled trial in which one group of more than a thousand patients received medical therapy and another group of equal size received medical therapy plus stents. The story does not mention that the new study was published in the New England Journal of Medicine simultaneous with its presentation at the annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology. Nor does it mention previous smaller studies that reached much the same conclusion. The story is careful to distinguish between coronary artery disease that is characterized by unstable, potentially dangerous angina and “stable situations” that are less likely to result in heart attacks and death. Rather than stirring up fear about disease, the broadcast is appropriately reassuring, pointing out that millions of people with stable angina can be safely treated with medication alone and do not require stents. The broadcast includes interviews with two experts, though it fails to provide details about their potential conflicts of interest, including the fact that Dr. Boden was the principal investigator of the trial under discussion. Claim: Heart stents found no more effective than drugs in prolonging life


Output: This broadcast nicely reassures viewers that millions of Americans with stable, non-emergency coronary artery disease can manage their heart problems well with medicine and do not need to undergo surgery to implant stents that prop open clogged arteries. It clearly differentiates between patients with “unstable” disease who might benefit from stenting and those in the current study with “stable situations” who have a lower risk of heart attacks and death—an important distinction for viewers to understand. The broadcast notes that about a million people receive coronary stents each year, and that, at $15,000 to $25,000 apiece, fewer procedures would save the healthcare system substantial amounts of money. Though the broadcast neglects to note some useful information—about the potential harms of drug therapy and stents, as well as about other therapies that might help patients with stable disease (including lifestyle interventions such as smoking cessation, changes in diet, and exercise)—the take-home message remains appropriate and clear:  “When it comes to getting a stent, most patients don’t need to rush,” according to ABC News correspondent John McKenzie. Readers should note that the new trial was published online in the New England Journal of Medicine to coincide with its presentation at the annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology, a detail omitted in the broadcast. Overall, this was a good job, especially within the often self-imposed limitations of TV news.