Sentence Correction

According to the Roper Global Diabetes Group, in 2007 the number of Americans living with diabetes was 16.6 million, a rise of 7 percent over the previous year and twice as much as 1997.

(A) twice as much as 1997
(B) twice as many as 1997
(C) a number double that of 1997's
(D) double what it was in 1997
(E) double the figure for 1997

OA E

I have several questions here. Does "twice as much as 1997" define "number", can we use much for "number", and if not, why many is still illegal?

Yes "many" should be used to refer to countable objects like "number of americans" but here Option B which uses many is wrong because it changes the meaning. It means "twice as many as 1997" - meaning 2x1997 americans is a 7% increase over 16million which make no sense.

E correctly states that the 16.6 million is a 7 percent increase over the previous year's figure (which should have been X where X = 16.6million x 100/107 )