The same way a small subset of the population might be responsible for a spike in crime. Even in the most crime-ridden neighborhoods most citizens obey the law. That doesn't invalidate crime statistics, nor a documented rise or decrease in crime stats.

What management is saying is that over the past few years there has been a spike in sick leave usage, even if it is a relatively small number of pilots generating most of the numbers. My problem was ALPA not contesting the data, not demanding comparative data, or if they did, not advertising that at all. I felt changing the sick policy for all of us due to the alleged actions of a few of us was not the right approach.