I would be very appreciated if someone could rate this argument task!
CarcassQuote:
The following appeared in a memo from the director of a large group of hospitals.
"In a laboratory study of liquid antibacterial hand soaps, a concentrated solution of UltraClean produced a 40 percent greater reduction in the bacteria population than did the liquid hand soaps currently used in our hospitals. During a subsequent test of UltraClean at our hospital in Workby, that hospital reported significantly fewer cases of patient infection than did any of the other hospitals in our group. Therefore, to prevent serious patient infections, we should supply UltraClean at all hand-washing stations throughout our hospital system."
Write a response in which you examine the stated and/or unstated assumptions of the argument. Be sure to explain how the argument depends on these assumptions and what the implications are for the argument if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
In this memo, the director of a large group of hospitals suggests people use a specific hand soap that was proven to have a better effect on preventing infections produced by UltraClean. It might be true that this specific hand soap does have a better effect based on the studies conducted, information currently available cannot convincingly lead to the conclusion that the director made. There are still some unsubstantiated assumptions in his statement, once they are proven to be warranted or not, the director’s recommendation will be largely altered.
To start with, the director’s recommendation is totally based on an assumption that the bacteria whose population is significantly reduced by the UltraClean hand soap in the laboratory study is the one that causes infection in the hospital among patients. While this UltraClean hand soap might have a significant effect on reducing a certain bacterium, the bacteria might have nothing to do with infections among patients because not all the bacteria existing in our world are harmful. Therefore, the directior’s recommendation will not hold if we prove that the bacteria reduced by UltraClean hand soap do not actually cause infections.
In addition, the director mentioned a follow-up test conducted in their hospital in Workby, which indicates that there are significantly fewer patients infected compared to other hospital in their group and concluded that using UltraClean hand soap throughout the hospital system will help reducing patient infections. It might look convincing at the first glance, but this suggestion assumes that the number of patients in each hospital in the group is almost the same. There is no evidence that each hospital is of the similar scale and has similar number of patients with other hospitals. There is a chance that the hospital they conducted the subsequent study in is much smaller than the others and has much fewer patients compared to the others. In this case, the director’s recommendation will be untenable.
While the two unsubstantiated assumptions mentioned above might be true, the director still made an unreasonable assumption that bacteria are the only source of infections and can be only transmitted or infected by hands. The director neglects that fact that there are other types of infections such as virus, and that a lot of infections are transmitted by air or other ways instead of simply by hands or touching. Once this assumption is proven to be warranted or not, the director’s suggestion will be changed.
To sum up, the hospital director recommends people put the UltraClean hand soap throughout the hospital system because of its significant effect on reducing bacteria. This recommendation is not solid with some important assumptions unclarified. If the director can provide further information, the argument will be seriously changed.
28 Jan 2022, 01:19 
