The relaxation of regulations governing the manufacture and sale of new medicines to increase their availability should not be accompanied by a lifting of all regulations that restrict industrial activity generally. Unless strict environmental regulations are maintained, endangered species of plants and animals will become extinct. And since a large majority of new medicines are derived from plants and animals, a general deregulatory approach could actually undermine the original intent of the relaxation of regulations governing the manufacture and sale of new medicines. The statement that a large majority of new medicines are derived from plants and animals plays which one of the following roles in the argument? ['support for the hypothesis that only very narrowly focused efforts at deregulation of industrial activity actually have beneficial results', 'evidence for a point of view that the argument is designed to undermine', 'a link between the extinction of species and the potentially decreased availability of new medicines', 'an illustration of the potential disaster that could result from continued overregulation of industrial activity']