I do agree the "avoid a medical shortage" white lie did harm their credibility, but I know why they did it (I think). It will be a good case study for bioethics and public policy students.

I always assumed the virus was airborne, and they tended to say outside was safer than inside. I haven't looked at the new way they're phrasing it, but I need to look more.

The J&J vaccine halt was done for scientific reasons, and precisely to instill confidence in people that the CDC is acting in good faith and isn't going to sling something out there without knowing all they can about its effects. That you think they made the wrong decision is funny if it weren't sad.

Finally, and I don't know you, but I think it's cute how all the CDC haters/people saying Fauci is evil are the ones who through the pandemic have laughed at the virus and said vaccines are evil. Now here we have an instance of someone skeptical of the CDC because they didn't give enough warning about the virus and they eroded trust in vaccines!