There’s a way to view all those mathematical probabilities, assess potential peril and stop punishing yourself with unnecessary precautions.
We’re often told that humans are lousy at judging risk, and the pandemic seems to have confirmed this in spades. What else can explain vaccine hesitancy or otherwise healthy people wearing two masks as they walk alone, outside?
Yet despite all the evidence pointing to our inability to make sense of risk, I’m still optimistic we can do better. To be fair, we’ve received many confusing messages from public health officials and the media. Take this excerpt from Smithsonian Magazine:
“The Moderna vaccine’s effectiveness was at 95 percent, per NPR. Pfizer-BioNTech had 80 percent effectiveness, and Johnson and Johnson was 60 percent effective. On average, the three vaccines were 86 percent effective at preventing hospitalization and 82 percent effective at preventing emergency room or urgent care visits, Vox reports.”
Continue reading the entire piece here at Bloomberg Opinion
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Allison Schrager is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal.
This piece originally appeared in Bloomberg Opinion