An old post of mine reminded me of a better way to think about the J&J vaccine, not that it matters (unless you're a J&J shareholder) since other vaccines are available, unless they're not.
http://earlyretirementextreme.com/my-hd ... -care.html
Specifically, NNT (numbers needed to treat), NNH (harm), NNV (vaccinate).
NNH is 1,000,000 (as discussed above)
The definition of "treatment" is a bit iffy but lets define treatment for a vaccine as something that keeps you out of the hospital.
Since Janssen keeps everybody out of the hospital, the NNT for 40-49 year olds is
https://www.statista.com/statistics/112 ... te-by-age/
100,000/176.8 = 565 .. but since these stats only included half a year and doesn't include the third wave, I feel comfortable dividing by (at least 2) to get 282, so
NNT is 282 (for the 40-49 yos) ... that is to say, you need to vaccinate 282 people to keep one person out of the hospital.
The NNV is defined by the inverse of the incidence rate. Unfortunately we haven't tested everybody so we don't know what it is. It also varies by location as some places are harder hit than others, we can put a limit on it. The Dakotas are the hardest hit in the nation with 13.5% of the population having tested positive at this point.
NNV is 1/0.135 = 7.4
In summary
NNH ~ 1,000,000
NNT ~ 250ish (for a 40-49yo)
NNV ~ 7 (for all ages)
Unless one is philosophically opposed, these are no-brainer ratios. People regularly take drugs with far worse ratios.
A COVID hospitalization course runs on the order of $10,000 to more than $100k. This gives the vaccine an fair/arbitrage market value (if you had to pay for it instead of getting it for free) for a 40-49yo of $10000/282 = $35 or more. (This estimate does not include lost hours for being sick at home or paying for long-hauler treatments which would increase the fair value.)