A Tough one..Experts Comment to analyze it Needed

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Recently, many critics of the U.S. government have pointed out that this country is the only industrialized nation without a national vaccine laboratory and suggested that this lack makes the American public more vulnerable than other advanced nations to diseases such as avian flu or other flu epidemics. When asked at a press conference,a government official said these critics were disloyal and thus wrong about the public's vulnerability. To support his claim, he cited the international pre-eminence of American doctors and hospitals as well as the middle ranking of
the United States among United Nation member nations in the health categories of infant mortality, life span, and nutrition. He also added that all of the Europeans that he knew preferred to undergo major medical treatments in the United States rather than in the socialized medical systems in place in their home countries.
All of the following are flaws in the official's logic EXCEPT:
"¢ The official accepts that the quality of physicians and hospitals is a major factor, albeit not the only one, affecting
the public's vulnerability to disease.
"¢ The critics could be disloyal but not wrong.
"¢ The Europeans that the official cited are overwhelmingly wealthy males over the age of fifty.
"¢ The official relies on health statistics that are based on a complete accounting of deaths, injuries, and illnesses suffered by the American public from all causes, including the ten percent attributable to infectious diseases.
"¢ The UN health ranking that the official cited is based on an almost complete survey of the nations of the world.

OA:A

I am not able to rule out the choices D and E. and C for that matter, is not even stated in the passage.

How did we rule out other answer choices. ?
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Source: — Critical Reasoning |

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by dimochka » Sun Jun 17, 2012 11:53 am
Hi,

(A) True statement, as we know that the official specifically mentions the pre-eminence of U.S. doctors and hospitals as one reason for critics being wrong.
(B) It's possible the critics are disloyal but not wrong, as we don't necessarily know whether the lack of vaccine laboratories results in increased vulnerability to flu epidemics.
(C) Picking a very specific population does not make that group a good study case. The U.S. could still be at a high risk of an epidemic, even if wealthy older European males prefer to be treated here. Also, preference to be treated here does not specifically refer to treatment for flu; it's possible that U.S. hospitals and doctors are better at treating complications in male patients over the age of 50.
(D) As our argument only deals with specifically flu epidemics, this is a flaw as these statistics do not give him a good overview of the topic at hand - out of scope.
(E) The UN health ranking has an account of all nations. The critics, on the other hand, identify the U.S. as the only industrialized nation without a national vaccine laboratory. If all other industrial nations are above the U.S. in the ranking, then the critics are right and this is a flaw.