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: Muskegon resident Pamela Anderson said that after hearing about numerous cases, she started a Facebook group about cancer deaths among people who live or have lived near the Butterworth landfill site in Grand Rapids. They plan to bring up the issue at a city commission meeting this week, the Grand Rapids Press reported . The group recently met with Kent County Health Department epidemiologist Brian Hartl, who advised them to collect more information on cancer rates in the area. “If there are rare forms of cancer, or cancers we’re seeing affect a young population, it might trigger further investigation,” Hartl said. But he cautioned that cancer is difficult to study, and that it can take years and multiple triggers to emerge. “Especially in small areas like a neighborhood or a block, it makes it challenging to connect it to environmental exposure,” Hartl said. “Most cancers are due to lifestyle choices, not environmental factors.” The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that theoretical cancer and health risks from the landfill exist, but that they’re limited to regular direct contact with the waste over several decades. The agency conducted a site cleanup in 1999, and removed material contaminated with polychlorinated biphenyl and chromium. The EPA said there is no current exposure at the site. “A lot of those kids in the ’60s and ’70s used to play in the dump,” said Shane Smith, who grew up down the street from Anderson in the Indiana Avenue neighborhood. “It was just starting to alarm to us, because my dad’s entire generation passed away from cancer.” Anderson said she’s having the soil tested for contaminants at a home in the same neighborhood. ___ Information from: The Grand Rapids Press, http://www.mlive.com/grand-rapids Claim: Residents investigate cancer rates near Michigan landfill.

Answer: A group of residents is investigating cancer rates in a western Michigan neighborhood that’s near a contaminated landfill classified as a Superfund site.


Question: Paragraph: The Food and Drug Administration will allow 22nd Century Group to begin selling the first low-nicotine cigarettes reviewed by federal health regulators. The products contain roughly 95% less nicotine than standard cigarettes, according to the FDA. Nicotine, which occurs naturally in tobacco plants, is the addictive chemical that makes cigarettes, chew and related products so hard to quit. Past efforts to sell similar low-nicotine products have fallen flat. Regulators stressed that their ruling does not mean the new products are safer than regular cigarettes. The agency noted there are no safe tobacco products. Cigarettes cause cancer, lung disease, stroke and a number of other deadly diseases. But the agency’s tobacco chief, Mitch Zeller, noted in a statement that 22nd Century Group’s products are the first cigarettes to show the potential “to help reduce nicotine dependence among addicted smokers.” The FDA is continuing to review a separate application from the company on whether the cigarettes present a reduced risk to smokers. The U.S. smoking rate has fallen to an all-time low of 14% of adults, or roughly 34 million Americans. But smoking remains the leading cause of preventable disease and death in the U.S., responsible for some 480,000 deaths annually Low-nicotine cigarettes are not a new idea. Philip Morris experimented with selling a line of them in the U.S. in the late 1980s, without much success. Since then, most low-nicotine cigarettes have been used for research purposes to study addiction in smokers. Kenneth Warner, a tobacco expert at the University of Michigan’s school of public health, called the idea “good in concept,” but said he would be “astonished if there’s much of a market for this.” There are several techniques for reducing nicotine, including chemical extraction and cross-breeding plants. Williamsville, New York-based 22nd Century Group plans to sell its cigarettes under the brand name Moonlight, in regular and menthol flavor. Last year, the FDA began the process for regulating nicotine in cigarettes to make them minimally or non-addictive. But the agency recently dropped the nicotine plan from its list of regulatory priorities. And tobacco companies have signaled their opposition. The FDA has sponsored several studies showing that when smokers switch to low-nicotine cigarettes they smoke less and are more likely to try quitting. The research was considered pivotal to establishing that smokers won’t compensate by smoking more cigarettes or inhaling more deeply if nicotine levels are low. That was sometimes the case with “light” and “low tar” cigarettes marketed in decades past. Those products were banned as misleading. ___ 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. Claim: US permits sale of cigarettes with 95% less nicotine.

Answer: U.S. health officials on Tuesday endorsed a type of cigarette that could help ease the addictive grip of smoking by delivering very low levels of nicotine.


Question: Paragraph: Researchers, who studied about 1,000 teens who said they wanted to quit smoking, wrote in the journal Pediatrics that close to 11 percent of those who got counseling for three months had quit smoking, compared to six percent of those who only received educational pamphlets. “A school nurse-delivered smoking-cessation intervention proved feasible and effective in improving short-term abstinence among adolescent boys and short-term reductions in smoking amount and frequency in both genders,” wrote study author Lori Pbert of the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester. But a year after the sessions, there was no difference in smoking rates based on what kind of assistance teens had gotten from their nurses. In addition, fewer than one in five teens said they hadn’t smoked recently. “It’s nice that there was some effect at three months, what we really care about is sustained cessation,” said Michael Siegel, who studies tobacco control at the Boston University School of Public health but wasn’t involved in the study. “The overwhelming majority of these kids are not quitting.”   In the 35 Massachusetts schools covered in the study, half the nurses were trained to give their students one-on-one counseling based around goal setting and problem solving, including making a plan to quit and then preventing relapses. The other nurses gave students information pamphlets on quitting smoking and volunteered to answer any questions they had about the process. Both groups of nurses saw their students at four weekly sessions, ranging from 10 to 30 minutes. The counseling intervention appeared to especially help boys in the short run. Those who had made goals and tracked progress with the nurses were three times more likely to say they had stopped smoking than boys in the “control” group. But between 13 and 17 percent of both boys and girls reported they had stopped lighting up a year later, regardless of whether or not they had received counseling. Other smoking cessation experts noted that relapsing into smoking is the biggest hurdle at any age, and that teens were especially likely to do so. But they added that the more options teens had for help, the better. SOURCE: bit.ly/o4z0xc Claim: Study: can school nurses help teens quit smoking?.

Answer:
Counseling sessions with a school nurse may help some high school students, especially boys, quit smoking — but only for a little while, according to a U.S. study.