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.
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Question: Paragraph: Scientists at Vienna University medical school’s Institute of Hygiene and Applied Immunology came to the conclusion after analyzing the water quality at 21 “holy” springs and 18 fonts at churches and chapels at various times of year. Only 14 percent of the water samples from holy sources showed no fecal contamination, and none of the springs could be recommended as a source of drinking water, the study presented to a conference in Vienna this week found. The springs held not only fecal contamination - likely the result of poor hygiene - but many also had agricultural nitrates and bugs that can cause inflammatory diarrhoea. “We need to warn people against drinking from these sources,” microbiologist Alexander Kirschner said in the study. Kirschner said the healing effects ascribed to holy sources arose from the hygienic conditions of the Middle Ages, when water quality in urban areas was generally so poor that people constantly contracted diarrhoea or other conditions. “If they then came across a protected spring in the forest that was not as polluted and drank from it for several days, their symptoms would disappear. So although in those days they were drinking healthier water, given the excellent quality of our drinking water today, the situation is now completely reversed.”  The study noted some ways to help address the problem, including regularly replacing holy water in church fonts. One Italian priest has invented a holy water dispenser that dispenses drops of holy water rather than having the faithful dip a hand in, it noted. Claim: Holy water in Austria unsafe to drink: researchers.

Answer: Holy water at religious shrines and churches in Austria is often contaminated with fecal matter and bacteria, researchers have found, advising the faithful not to drink it, especially in hospital chapels.


Question: Paragraph: There is no discussion of cost in this release. The journal article says several institutions refused to provide their prices. Nevertheless, the high cost of robotic surgery is an important issue. The researchers wrote they were unable to say whether those high costs might be offset [or not] by certain potential benefits (such as shorter hospital stays), but the release should have at least acknowledged the cost issues. The release does report the percentage of patients in the robot-assisted and open surgery groups that were still alive with no signs of disease progression two years after their procedures: 72.3 percent of patients in the robotic surgery group compared with 71.6 percent in the open surgery group… and it notes the difference was not statistically significant. It also reports that the robot-assisted surgery patients checked out of the hospital after six days on average, compared to 7 days for those in the open surgery group. The release reports only half as much blood loss in the robot surgery group, but does not report the amounts, which averaged 300 mL in the robot-assisted group vs. 700 mL in the open surgery group… that’s a difference of less than one pint. The release reports that patients who had robot-assisted surgery spent more time in the operating room than those having open procedures (seven hours vs. six hours). It also reports overall rates of adverse effects (67 percent in the robot group vs. 69 percent in the open group), along with listing the most common problems: urinary tract infections and intestinal obstructions. It would have helped if the release had pointed out that these complication rates were not statistically different. In a way, the release is satisfactory and yet maddeningly unsatisfactory. It tells readers that the study was a randomly controlled trial with 350 patients, but it buries the most important point: that the ability of these researchers to do this sort of rigorous trial comparing robot-assisted surgery with open techniques highlights how few such trials are done. Deep in the release, the researchers are quoted as saying the findings “underscore the need for further high-quality trials to assess surgical innovation before this surgical technique is widely adopted in clinical practice” and further that “It is important to conduct these trials before widespread adoption of technology, as has been the case with robotic prostatectomy (removal of the prostate).” The quality of the evidence should have been the lead. The release does not exaggerate the prevalence of bladder cancer. It does not push treatment on those who are unlikely to benefit. The release could be interpreted as promoting a newer more expensive form of therapy that doesn’t provide any advantages over the standard therapy. Although the release reports that the study was supported by the National Cancer Institute, it fails to note the financial disclosures several researchers made about money they have received from companies relevant to this study. The comparison of robot-assisted to open surgery was the main point of the release. The release makes clear that both techniques are available… including at the institution that issued the release. The release could have informed readers that, according to the published paper, that all of the operators in this study had done at least 10 robot-assisted cystectomies before being allowed to participate in the study. When widespread adoption of the robot-assisted procedure occurs, it would be possible that many surgeons would not have completed that many robotic cystectomies. While the release does tell readers that what is really new here is the use of randomization to compare robot-assisted surgery to open surgery for bladder cancer, it manages to bury that lead so deep under the poorly worded description of the results of this non-inferiority trial that the thrust of the release is unsatisfactory. The release doesn’t employ unjustified, sensational language. Claim: Robotic surgery as effective as open surgery for bladder cancer

Answer: This news release about a trial that randomly assigned people with bladder cancer to either robot-assisted or open surgery buried the real news under a weak lead that garbles the findings. The news here is that, contrary to assertions of many proponents of robot-assisted surgery, it is possible to randomize patients in order to get a valuable comparison instead of relying on weaker study designs that can’t answer the fundamental question about how old and new techniques compare. The release is rated as satisfactory on many criteria because key information was included in the body of the release, but the headline proclaiming that robot surgery is “as effective” as open surgery misses the larger point. The headline and lead also put a pro-robot spin on the results, which could also be summarized as robot surgery is “not clearly worse.” Also not explained: robot-assisted surgery is more expensive. The final sentence of the release, a quote from a researcher, should have been the lead: “It is important to conduct these trials before widespread adoption of technology, as has been the case with robotic prostatectomy (removal of the prostate).”  We are bombarded with releases and news stories trumpeting results from studies of robot-assisted surgery that don’t actually compare the new technology to existing practice. These studies often lack any control group or use historical data that may not be truly comparable. The promoters of expensive new devices then claim that they are relying on the best available evidence. This trial shows better evidence can (and should) be gathered. And in this case, good quality evidence indicates little difference in the techniques, despite what all the big hospital billboards about robot surgery proclaim.


Question: Paragraph: The story does not mention the cost of mammography (or of follow up tests and treatments) to the individual, or, collectively, to society. And these costs are substantial. Based on the results of this study, 2,500 women would have to be screened every other year for a decade in order to prevent one death from breast cancer. As the story points out, during that same time 1,000 of those women would have at least one false alarm and 500 would undergo an unnecessary biopsy, thus adding to the price tag. On balance, this story does a fair job of describing the benefits of screening mammography as seen in this study. It reports the apparent 10 percent reduction in breast cancer deaths, while also pointing out that because relatively few women in the 50-69 age group die of breast cancer, that reduction can also be described as cutting the 10-year risk of death from 4.4 per 1,000 women to 4 per 1,000. The second statistic helps counteract popular assumptions about how many middle-aged women die from breast cancer. However, the framing of a story – and who gets the last word – sometimes overwhelms evidence-based explanations earlier in the story. That almost happened with this story, which gives the final word to an advocate of annual breast cancer screening for all women beginning by age 40, which is just the sort of blanket recommendation this latest study calls into question. The story includes a comment that because mammograms detect lumps that would not have become life-threatening, five to 15 women may be treated for every one whose life is saved by treatment. The story oversimplifies the methods used by researchers, saying they compared “women who were similar in most ways, except that one group received mammograms and the other didn’t,” without explaining that this was not a randomized trial where some women were assigned to screening and others weren’t, but rather an observational study that looked at data on women during a 9-year period when Norway phased in mammography region by region. The story does alert readers to some of the limitations of the study: one, that a longer follow-up period might have shown more benefit to screening and, two, that the researchers had no information on whether any of the women received mammograms outside of the national screening program. It’s a tossup for us to grade and, as we do in most such cases, we’ll give the story the benefit of the doubt. Claim: Mammogram benefits more modest than doctors thought

Answer:
However, it does not explain to readers what is new or different about this study compared to earlier reports. Also, the final word in the story goes to an expert who touts benefits of mammography screening that clash with what was seen in this study. By comparing this story with, for example, the Philadelphia Inquirer and WebMD stories, you see how some of the gaps we’ve identified were addressed by competitors, giving readers a more complete and helpful story.