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'.
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Question: Paragraph: A price range of $200,000 to $250,000 for the device was included in the story. However, there was no mention of physician fees or hospital stay costs. The longest a patient has lived with device was included in the story, but no range was given for the length of time patients survived with the device for reference. While putting a premium on the “one more Christmas, one more birthday” concept, there was no discussion about the differences in quality of life experienced by the patients receiving the device. Only the results from the longest living recipient of the device were included in the article. For balance, it would have been useful to include the average amount of time that people survived with the device as well as some mention of consequences of the treatment that may affect quality of life. Further, it is hard to predict who will live “less than a month.” It is possible that some recipients may have their life shortened (death in surgery or immediately thereafter). The article mentions that the evidence about the device comes from only 14 patients to date who have had it implanted. No overt disease-mongering, although the story contained no information on the prevelance of heart failure or the percentage of individuals with heart failure for whom this treatment might be considered. The article contained quotes from physicians directly involved in the clinical trial leading to the humanitarian device exemption, family members of patients who had, on balance, positive experiences with the device and the director of the FDA division responsible for the decision. The article would have been improved had it contained the views of some individuals slightly more removed from the device itself to help provide a framework in which to consider the ramifications of this treatment. While mentioning that this device is only for patients with advanced heart failure who have no other options and would otherwise die, the story just three sentences later quotes a surgeon stating that the device’s approval “gives tons of hope to people with end-stage heart failure”. This paints a somewhat unrealistic picture about the limited group of patients for whom the device is an option. In addition to only being intended for those who are not eligible for a heart transplant and who would likely live less than a month without the device, it is only for patients whose chest is large enough to hold the device. Although the story didn’t explain that the device was only approved by the FDA using the “Humanitarian Device Exemption,” it did say that sales of only up to 4,000/yr would be allowed and that it is much more likely that far fewer will be sold. The story also explained that the device will be available at only 5 institutions in the U.S. It is valuable for readers to understand the limited availability of this device for appropriate expectations. The story was clear that only 14 people have received this medical device. The article does not appear to rely exclusively on a press release. However, the quotes attributed to Dr. Daniel Schultz, director of the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health came from the FDA news release on the device, found at http://www.fda.gov/bbs/topics/NEWS/2006/NEW01443.html. Claim: FDA approves AbioCor heart

Answer: 1


Question: Paragraph: The European Medicines Agency had already restricted the use of Protelos - also known as Osseor or strontium ranelate - last April but its pharmacovigilance committee said on Friday the drug should no longer be used to treat osteoporosis at all. The move follows an analysis which found that for every 1,000 patient-years there were four more cases of serious heart problems, including heart attacks, and four more cases of blood clots among patients taking the drug than those on placebo. The recommendation will now be sent to the agency’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use, which is expected to issue a final opinion at its January 20-23 meeting. Claim: EU panel recommends suspension of risky bone disease drug.

Answer: 2


Question: Paragraph: On 18 March 2016, an image of an opossum was uploaded to Imgur with overlaid text reading as follows:  Given the frequently absurd nature of “amazing facts” memes, many viewers were rightly skeptical of the claim attached to that photograph. The image provided no citations to substantiate the information it presented, and the notion that opossums were a possible tool in the epidemiological battle against Lyme disease seemed implausible to some. As it turned out, there is at least some truth to the opossum-as-tick-slayer rumors. On 18 April 2014, the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies and NewsTimes published an article that focused on the role of opossums in the spread of Lyme disease with respect to their role in the ecosystem: [N]ow ecologists have learned something else about opossums. They’re a sort of magnet when it comes to riding the world of black-legged ticks, which spread Lyme disease. “Don’t hit opossums if they’ve playing dead in the road,” said Richard Ostfeld, of the Cary Institute for Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, N.Y. Ostfeld is forest ecologist and an expert on the environmental elements of infectious diseases like Lyme disease. Several years ago, scientists … tested six species — white-footed mice, chipmunks, squirrels, opossums and veerys and catbirds — by capturing and caging them, and then exposing each test subject to 100 ticks … [O]f the six, the opossums were remarkably good at getting rid of the ticks — much more so that any of the others. [A]mong other opossum traits, there is this: They groom themselves fastidiously, like cats. If they find a tick, they lick it off and swallow it … Extrapolating from their findings, Ostfeld said, the team estimated that in one season, an opossum can kill about 5,000 ticks … Some ticks end up getting their blood meal from the possum. But more than 90 percent of them ended up being groomed away and swallowed. “They’re net destroyers of ticks,” Ostfeld said. Ostfeld had previously discouraged disruption of opossum populations for this reason. In July 2012, he said in a podcast: Because many ticks try to feed on opossums and few of them survive the experience. Opossums are extraordinarily good groomers it turns out — we never would have thought that ahead of time — but they kill the vast majority — more than 95% percent of the ticks that try to feed on them. So these opossums are walking around the forest floor, hoovering up ticks right and left, killing over 90% of these things, and so they are really protecting our health. Ostfeld was also named as one author of a September 2009 study in Proceedings of the Royal Society which examined animal kingdom hosts “as ecological traps for the vector of Lyme disease” and asserted that: By subjecting field-caught hosts to parasitism by larval blacklegged ticks, we found that some host species (e.g. opossums, squirrels) that are abundantly parasitized in nature kill 83–96% of the ticks that attempt to attach and feed, while other species are more permissive of tick feeding. [T]he vast majority (96.5%) of larval ticks that encounter an opossum and attempt to feed are apparently consumed. Working backwards, [we calculate that] during any given week in the larval activity peak, each opossum must host more than 5500 larval ticks to produce 199 that successfully feed. By this logic, during the larval peak, each mouse encounters approximately 50 larval ticks per week, almost half of which feed to repletion and become nymphs. As far as “amazing facts” images go, the opossum/Lyme disease one was very well researched, with numbers that matched up with what ecologists have learned about opossums, deer ticks, and the spread of Lyme disease in recent years (although those studies surmised opossums kill approximately 5,000 ticks per season, not per week). Claim: Opossums kill thousands of ticks each week, inhibiting the spread of Lyme Disease to humans.

Answer:
2