Read the passage and determine the author's primary argument regarding pharmaceutical clinical trials:

"Offshoring clinical drug trials to low-income developing nations drastically reduces corporate operational costs. However, ethical guidelines are compromised when participants are recruited from populations lacking basic healthcare access, creating 'therapeutic misconception' where destitute patients mistake experimental trials for guaranteed medical therapy."

The author argues that offshoring clinical trials to developing nations:

Answer and explanation

Correct answer: B. creates severe ethical conflicts by exploiting vulnerable patient populations

  1. Step 1: Analyze the ethical critique: the author highlights that while offshoring cuts costs, it creates severe ethical dilemmas because desperate, uninsured populations mistake research trials for guaranteed treatment.
  2. Step 2: The author's argument is that offshoring exploits structural healthcare vulnerabilities, generating ethical violations.
Answer
creates severe ethical conflicts by exploiting vulnerable patient populations.
Why not the others: 'should be accelerated to eliminate all domestic pharmaceutical testing' contradicts the author's ethical warning; 'guarantees free lifelong healthcare to every trial participant' contradicts the text's assertion that participants suffer from therapeutic misconception; 'has completely eliminated all toxic drug side effects in medicine' is scientifically impossible.

Practise more Higher Education Reading, Text Analysis, and Scientific Evaluation.

Free questions with an explanation for every one, and full timed MUET Malaysia (Malaysian University English Test) mock tests.