ACT Reading 2.10 Natural Science Passage

Substances and Disease Registry.

We're glad this is clarified because, based on the information about the ATSDR in the

rest of the passage, we might think it stood for the Alarmingly Terrible Society of Death

and Recrimination.

Anyway, knowing what the ATSDR is supposed to be doing is the key to narrowing down these choices.

We can nix (D) without too much thought.

From the very beginning of the passage, it's glaringly obvious that Congress is the one

investigating the ATSDR, not the other way around.

Although we're sure that, if the ATSDR did want to investigate Congress, they'd find

all sorts of...um...interesting information.

Answer (C) isn't tough to eliminate either.

As we learned in an earlier question, the CDC and the ATSDR are sister agencies.

Since they're equals in a way, it wouldn't necessarily make sense for one to crack down on the other.

Although, as sister agencies, it would make sense for them to fight over their parent's love.

Choice (B) is a certainly a temptation.

All the bad stuff that the passage describes does happen in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

However, from the report we can infer that the ATSDR is responsible for investigating

environmental threats like contaminated drinking water or soil, not natural disasters.

Sure, Katrina did do a lot of contaminating, but this answer is too generally focused on

the storm and not the specific aftereffects that the ATSDR is supposed to deal with.

This leaves us with choice (A), the correct answer.

...since one of the agency's main focuses is figuring out what's going on when a single

community reports lots of cases of a disease.

Although, if this report is in any way accurate, the ATSDR took kind of a hands off approach

when it came to the refugees in post-Katrina New Orleans.

Make that a total hands-off approach...