Continuing to use Johnson & Johnson's vaccine could save 1,400 lives in the next 6 months, the CDC says

• The US has ended its pause of Johnson & Johnson's vaccine rollout.
• Despite reports of rare blood clots, the shot could save 1,400 lives in six months, the CDC found.
• That number assumes the shot would be given at half the rate it was before the pause.

US regulators determined last week that the benefits of Johnson & Johnson's vaccine far outweighed the risks.

After a 10-day pause to investigate the shot's links to rare blood clots, US states were permitted on Friday to resume administering J&J's vaccine.

A new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention calculated how many lives the shot could save in the next six months. According to the CDC's model, continuing to administer the J&J vaccine at just half the rate at which it was used in early April could prevent 580 to 1,400 coronavirus deaths.

Depending on how quickly the virus spreads, the vaccine might prevent 3,900 to 9,400 hospital admissions and 930 to 2,200 intensive-care-unit admissions, the report said.

The CDC model suggested that 26 cases of rare blood clots could be expected during the six months with the slower rollout.

The US paused Johnson & Johnson's vaccine rollout on April 13 following six reports of cerebral venous sinus thrombosis, a rare blood clot that forms in the brain, among women between 18 and 48 who'd received J&J's shot. The women also reported low levels of platelets, or colorless blood cells that help clots form - a condition known as thrombocytopenia. That combination is unusual.

At a meeting on Friday, the CDC voted to resume the rollout of J&J's vaccine and add a warning that "rare clotting events might occur after vaccination, primarily among women aged 18-49." The warning says it's "plausible" that the vaccine caused the clots.

As of Tuesday, the CDC had recorded 17 cases of rare blood clots combined with low platelet counts following J&J's shot. That's out of 8 million people in the US who've received the vaccine.

The two latest cases, announced Tuesday, were a man and a woman, both under 60. Of the 15 clot cases observed before those two, 13 had occurred among women 18 to 49, while two had occurred among women 50 and older. All 15 women were hospitalized, and three died.

The CDC said on Tuesday that the data did not justify restricting the shot to less vulnerable groups such as men or women 50 and older.

The CDC's model found that for every 1 million doses of J&J's vaccine administered to women between 18 and 49, nearly 300 coronavirus-related hospitalizations and six coronavirus-related deaths could be prevented, while seven clotting cases could be expected.

The CDC report said that while limiting the vaccine's use to specific populations could reduce the number of rare blood clots, it would "challenge public health implementation, limit personal choice, and disproportionately affect populations with barriers to vaccine access or who have difficulty returning for a second dose."

J&J's vaccine is the only single-dose shot authorized in the US, so it's the easiest to administer. It's also far easier to store than the vaccines from Pfizer or Moderna, since it can be kept in standard refrigerators rather than freezers.

If the shot were no longer available, the CDC wrote, "excess COVID-19 cases and deaths could occur."