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.

[EX Q]: Paragraph: In 2009, there were 119.45 male newborns for every 100 females, down from 120.56 in 2008 and the first decline in years, said Li Bin, head of the State Population and Family Planning Commission. The natural ratio should be about 105 males per 100 females at birth, but the gap has widened in China since it introduced a one-child policy three decades ago to curb population growth — a restriction that bolstered a traditional preference for boys. Wider use of ultrasound and abortions has caused the imbalance to increase significantly in recent years, shocking ordinary Chinese and alarming leaders who worry violence and instability could plague a society full of unmarried young men. “Looked at from a comprehensive perspective, the lopsided sex ratio at birth has started to be contained,” Li said in comments reported on the government’s main website (www.gov.cn). She said it would take many more years to consolidate the trend, calling for more vigilance in rooting out pre-birth gender scans and abortions that do not serve a medical purpose. More than 24 million Chinese men of marrying age could find themselves without spouses in 2020, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences said last year. The government research institution named the imbalance as the most serious demographic problem faced by the country’s 1.3 billion population. Claim: China takes baby steps in narrowing gender imbalance.
[EX A]: China has taken its first baby steps in narrowing a gender chasm that has left the country with tens of millions more boys than girls, an official said on Thursday.

[EX Q]: Paragraph: Washington’s governor banned large public events in three counties on Wednesday, a strategy guided by the work of Trevor Bedford and his colleagues, who have estimated there are currently 1,100 active cases in the state, most of them undiscovered by testing. Like a detective studying fingerprints, Bedford uses the genetic code the virus leaves behind. The dots he connects are mutations in the genetic alphabet of the virus, a 30,000-letter string that changes at the rate of one letter every 15 days. Those tiny mutations don’t change the virus’ effect on people, but they do allow scientists to draw conclusions about how it spreads from person to person. After a person gets tested for the virus with nasal and throat swabs, a small bit of the specimen can be used to rapidly sequence the virus’ genome. That work has been happening, not just in Seattle, but in other labs around the world. Scientists are sharing their results on a public platform where they’ve been sharing influenza genome data since 2008. This week, Bedford’s lab at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center worked with California researchers to find links between a cluster of cases in the Seattle area and the outbreak on the Grand Princess cruise ship in California. “They all are very similar genetically,” Bedford told The Associated Press. “It seems very possible” that virus from the Washington outbreak made it onto the Grand Princess. Dr. Charles Chiu at the University of California, San Francisco, agreed. He provided genome sequencing of seven samples from infected passengers who got off the Grand Princess this week. An eighth sample from an earlier Grand Princess cruise to Mexico had ties to Washington state, Chiu said, and that person likely seeded the outbreak among passengers on board as the ship left for Hawaii. “The simplest explanation,” Chiu said, is that the earlier Grand Princess passenger had been in Washington state and then seeded the cruise ship outbreak. There’s an alternative explanation, Chiu said. A cruise passenger or crew member was infected in another country, coincidentally by a virus with the same mutations as the Washington state cases. “Common sense tells you it more likely came from Washington,” Chiu said. For most people, the coronavirus causes only mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia. The vast majority of people recover within a few weeks. Based on genome sequencing of 18 Washington state cases, Bedford believes the state outbreak began with one person, perhaps the 35-year-old man who was the first known U.S. case. The coronavirus infection rate in the Seattle Flu Study, a project mapping seasonal flu, indicates there could be 1,100 active COVID-19 infections in the state, although because of limitations in the modeling that number could range from as low as 210 to as high as 2,800 active infections. Health authorities tried to trace all the people who had contact with the first U.S. case, a resident of Snohomish County, north of Seattle, who had visited Wuhan, the Chinese city that was the initial epicenter of the outbreak. He landed at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Jan. 15 and started feeling sick the next day. On Jan. 19, he visited a clinic in and was hospitalized on Jan. 20. “They did very aggressive contact tracing looking to identify anybody who had had contact with that initial case and sort of concentric circles outward,” Dr. Nancy Messonnier of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday. She called Bedford’s work “an interesting hypothesis,” but said the outbreak could have been caused by “a secondary seeding.” Kristian Andersen, a genetic epidemiologist at Scripps Research in La Jolla, California, agreed that the virus was introduced to Washington state by one person and suggested that the active cases probably exceed 1,100. Neither of the conclusions Bedford described is a surprise, he said in an email. “The United States has completely failed to prepare for the pandemic — despite having adequate time — and we currently have one of the lowest capacity for COVID-19 testing,” he wrote. “This continues to be an enormous problem and it is highly likely that we are currently be missing the vast majority of cases occurring across the country.” “Unless our ability to detect cases is transformed within days and aggressive strategies for responses are put in place, within a couple of weeks, we are going to find ourselves in a situation that is very similar to the one currently unfolding in Italy,” Andersen wrote. ___ Associated Press Science Writer Malcolm Ritter in New York contributed to this report. ___ The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support  from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content. ___ Follow AP coverage of the virus outbreak at https://apnews.com/VirusOutbreak and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak Claim: Scientist links 2 state outbreaks with genetic fingerprints.
[EX A]: A U.S. scientist is helping public health authorities understand and track the coronavirus, turning up clues about how it arrived and spread through Washington state and beyond, including potentially seeding an outbreak on the Grand Princess cruise ship.

[EX Q]: Paragraph: Dr. Brad Black runs the nonprofit Center for Asbestos Related Disease (CARD) and perhaps more than anyone he sees a clear picture of Libby’s plague — but it’s a picture that muddies the further one strays from the former mining town, and away from its medical professionals who have been charting an alarming rate of asbestos-related lung disease here for nearly two decades. A doctor in Libby since 1977, Black has been at the front lines of Libby’s asbestos fight, and despite all the fuss that’s been made over Libby in the last 20 years — despite the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s 2009 declaration of a public health emergency, the first such designation since the federal Superfund law passed in 1980; despite the more than $575 million spent in cleanup costs; and despite the well-documented asbestos contamination that’s sickened thousands and killed hundreds — Black is still waging an uphill battle. “We keep on plugging because that’s all we can do,” Black said recently in a basement conference room at the CARD clinic. “When you have new patients coming through the door on a regular basis, your primary objective is to provide them with care. And that’s what we’re trying to do.” Still, there’s more to Black’s work than traditional patient care, particularly as he and his colleagues pioneer new and innovative research in an effort to better understand Libby’s rarefied breed of toxic fibers. He and the CARD staff are also striving to educate the broader medical community about how they’re diagnosing asbestos-related health problems, and why they’re interpreting the faint hues of gray and white that appear on thousands of patients’ X-ray and CT images as disease when other pulmonologist colleagues don’t see it. Lung disease caused from Libby Amphibole asbestos is difficult to detect because it develops subtly and forms a thin layer along the interior chest wall, where it may blend in with shadows, Black said. The scarring of the lungs is progressive in Libby patients exposed to asbestos fibers, so being able to see the scarring and gauge its growth early on through scans is critical for care, he said. “We’ve tried very hard to get people to see what we’re seeing,” Black said. “Radiology is a gray world. You’re looking at gray shadows and everyone sees it differently. If you don’t know the disease, if you don’t know what you’re looking for, if you haven’t been tracking it here for 18 years, you won’t understand. You’ve got to know what you’re looking for.” Unfortunately, what Black’s looking for is precisely what he’s finding. New patients still arrive with metronomic regularity at the CARD clinic, a small medical clinic located off Mineral Avenue. Last year alone, 837 patients were screened and 209 were diagnosed, according to Tracy McNew, CARD’s administrative director. McNew says that’s a figure that falls right in line with the clinic’s annual diagnostic rate of about 25 percent, which, when taking into account its nearly 20-year existence, portrays a bleak picture. “Even after all this time, we’re still receiving new patients all the time,” she said. Two decades ago, the scope of asbestos exposure in Libby came to light when news reports detailed a link between the deadly fibers unearthed at a vermiculite mine operated by W.R. Grace and Co. between 1963 and 1990 and the hundreds of people who were sick and dying because of exposure to asbestos-laden dust. Two of the diseases most commonly associated with asbestos — asbestosis and mesothelioma — have latency periods of up to 40 years. That means people who were exposed to the asbestos dust could continue to develop illnesses for generations to come. “Conservative estimates put us out until 2030, so it won’t go away for a while,” Black said. “Again, those are conservative estimates. It’s really hard to predict how many sick people we’re going to see, but it’s going to be a lot.” Still, even as the volume of patients at the CARD clinic continues to swell, there’s a relative dearth of science. That’s because despite the millions spent by the federal government, no real investment has been made in scientific studies that would help answer some basic questions, such as: Does an effective treatment exist? Are there markers, like blood proteins, to help identify asbestos-related disease in patients before the air-constricting symptoms arrive? To what degree do genetics play a role in determining who gets sick? Do autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis and lupus serve as a precursor to asbestos-related disease and lung cancer? And why does Libby’s particular brand of asbestos, a toxic cocktail of several naturally occurring mineral fibers, cause such devastating disease to people with short-term exposure? “There’s a real misunderstanding that there has to be a long-term occupational exposure,” Black said. “Even low levels can lead to very serious lung disease. We have people in our population who had very brief exposures and 10 years later they have the disease. The level that it takes to cause significant disease is really hard to believe. But that’s Libby’s pattern.” Libby’s pattern is unlike that seen in most commercial asbestos, which belongs to a family called chrysotile asbestos, tiny fibers that, when inhaled, spiral into lung tissue like corkscrews. But Libby’s asbestos hails from the amphibole family, dart-shaped fibers that, when inhaled, lodge in the outer lining of the lung, or the pleura, a thin, elastic sac that, when healthy, expands and contracts in time with a person’s breathing. But when the pleura is riddled with rigid, dart-shaped asbestos fibers, it begins to scar over, rendering the soft, pink tissue that was once thin as plastic wrap into something that’s thick as an orange peel. Disease that’s the result of Libby’s asbestos can also be tricky to diagnose because it remains latent for years, then progresses at rates that have stunned medical professionals. Black and his colleagues might read abnormalities on a patient’s X-ray or CT images years before the patient ever exhibits symptoms. Many patients at the CARD clinic request screenings simply because they’ve lived in Libby and may have been inadvertently exposed to the dust. Because of a provision former U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Montana, inserted into the Obama administration’s health care reform bill, the Affordable Care Act, victims of asbestos-related disease in Libby are eligible for a range of federal health care benefits, including services not normally covered by Medicare. The provision provides funding for screenings as well as Medicare coverage for all Libby residents with asbestos-related disease. Under a special Medicare pilot program, the government also pays for services not included under Medicare, such as home care, medical equipment, counseling, help with travel, and medications not covered by Medicare prescription plans. It’s a boon to current and former Libby residents unsure whether they’ve been exposed. Studies by the EPA explain how the old vermiculite mine on Zonolite Mountain dispersed about 5,000 pounds of amphibole asbestos fibers over Libby every day the mill operated. It was sprinkled on the local ball field, used on the high school track, piled in heaps around the community, trucked away by train, and used as insulation in millions of homes across the country. “In Libby, there are all kinds of pathways to exposure. It’s not just miners. People played in piles of the stuff when they were kids,” Black said. “A lot of the time we’ll screen hunters who grew up here and suddenly notice they can’t hike uphill any more without stopping every 15 feet to catch their breath.” The findings in Libby could have larger implications for helping doctors across the country better diagnose people who were exposed to the amphibole fibers and moved away or were exposed to the fibers through one of the many products made with asbestos from the Northwest Montana mine. Doctors might not recognize the more progressive form of lung disease caused by amphibole fibers, instead believing patients were exposed to chrysotile fibers, which make up 95 percent of asbestos use, Black said. Still, Black is sympathetic to his colleagues who don’t see what he sees on patients’ scans. “It’s been a challenge since we started,” he said. “Prior to 2000, we didn’t know anything. It was all a new experience for me because what we were seeing was so different than what we were trained to look for. We didn’t know what we were looking for.” “This isn’t your grandfather’s asbestos disease,” he added. In 2017, Black and his colleagues published a groundbreaking study that validated their interpretation of abnormalities they detected in imagery and scans that other radiologists dismissed. The case involved a 74-year-old former Libby resident who worked as a millwright at the vermiculite mine from 1969 until its closure in 1990. He moved out of the area in 1991, and had no other known exposure to asbestos fibers. In 2011, he developed increasing chest pain, and in 2013 lung cancer screening detected a new, solid nodule that continued to grow on follow-up scans. When the patient was referred for a lobectomy, a procedure that involves removing a section of the lung, analysis of the tissue revealed physical proof of what Black and his colleagues had detected on the patient’s scans — it was riddled with asbestos fibers, specifically, 5.5 million fibers per gram of wet lung lining. “Most people would never have interpreted this patient’s scans as positive,” Black said. “And here we had physical proof, not just a radiologist’s interpretation. It was an ideal case because it showed exactly what we have been seeing — a high fiber burden that would not have been recognized as abnormal by most radiologists. Here, we were able to show it and compare it to the finer features of the scan.” It was the first case in which lung tissue from a Libby miner was evaluated for fiber analysis. “We know what we’re looking for but to train other people to see it over time is a challenge,” he said. Even as Black and his colleagues, like Dr. Albert Miller, who specializes in pulmonary medicine and performs work at the Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York, seek to mount more scientific evidence to better understand Libby’s asbestos disease, and better imagery to diagnose it, thousands of lawsuits plod on through the legal channels. Although W.R. Grace is no longer a defendant in legal actions, other defendants remain embroiled in lawsuits: International Paper, which owns the firm that operated a lumber mill in Libby; Grace’s insurance carrier, Maryland Casualty; Burlington Northern Santa Fe, which trucked the asbestos-laced ore to communities across the country; and the state of Montana, which knew about the mine contaminants for decades. Black says the paper warfare waged in the lawsuits is time-consuming, and something he’d “rather do without.” The Montana Supreme Court recently appointed six additional Asbestos Claim Court judges to handle the thousands of claims pending against dozens of defendants, a bloated docket that until the high court’s decision last month fell on a single jurist’s desktop. The Asbestos Claims Court was created in November 2017, with the Honorable Amy Eddy, 11th Judicial District in Kalispell, appointed as the judge for pretrial proceedings for the 545 plaintiffs identified at that time, all of them fighting for reparations stemming from asbestos exposure from a now-defunct vermiculite mine in Libby, owned and operated by W.R. Grace, which derailed the cases for years after the company filed for federal bankruptcy. With the federal proceedings over, the clot of cases is coursing through a constricted legal artery, even as the docket continues to swell. Eddy said an additional six judges is barely scratching the surface of what’s needed to efficiently handle the volume, and they’re performing the work without compensation, on a voluntary basis. “A total of seven judges just isn’t enough with so many hundreds of complex cases based primarily in Northwest Montana,” she said. Now, similar lawsuits are being filed against Johnson & Johnson following reports that some of the company’s talc used in its baby products contained asbestos fibers, including tremolite fibers that have been the culprit in Libby. So if the fundamental science still has yet to be performed in Libby, ground-zero in the nation for asbestos-related disease, what are the implications for new discoveries of asbestos exposure in other corners of industry, which will spawn thousands more lawsuits? “We could have more science and it would still be a battle. It’s the nature of the game,” Black said. “But more science is exactly what we need.” With a limited budget, and in some cases no budget whatsoever to perform the necessary studies, Black says the scientific community is missing out on a monumental opportunity. “We have the perfect population to perform these studies on, but to find the money? Nobody has it,” Black said. “In the world of asbestos, it’s tough to get a fair shake.” “To lose this opportunity with the Libby population is one of the biggest mistakes we can make,” he added. Claim: 20 years later, Libby’s asbestos fight goes on.
[EX A]:
The bleak world of asbestos science is tinged with subtle hues of gray and white, barely perceptible shadows that don’t strike the untrained eye as anything abnormal. But for those whose lives and careers are defined by the hundreds of people sick and dying in this tiny mountain community, the reality of the human tragedy that’s been unfolding here for decades is crystal clear.