Pfizer and Modern Covid-19 vaccines do not appear to pose a serious risk during pregnancy, according to research

Pregnant women with Covid-19 are at greater risk for serious diseases and may be at increased risk for adverse outcomes, such as preterm birth, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The study, together with existing research showing that mRNA vaccines are effective in pregnant and lactating women, suggests that the benefits of the vaccines outweigh the risks.

The new study examined data on 35,691 pregnant people between 14 December 2020 and 28 February 2021 of the CDC’s V-secure smartphone-based surveillance system, as well as data from the CDC’s Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS). All participants were pregnant and 16 to 54 years old.

The researchers followed a group in the V-safe system to gather more data on pregnancy outcomes and complications. This registry included 3,958 pregnant participants (out of the 35,691) who received an mRNA vaccine. They found that there were 827 completed pregnancies, and 115 (13.9%) experienced a pregnancy loss, while 712 (86.1%) resulted in a live birth. Early births occurred in 9.4% of the participants and only 3.2% of these births were in the small pregnancies. No neonatal deaths were reported.

There were 221 pregnancy-related side effects reported in the VAERS registry of the CDC, and 46 of them were miscarriages.

“Although not directly comparable, the calculated ratios of unfavorable pregnancies and neonatal outcomes in persons vaccinated against Covid-19 who had a full-term pregnancy were similar to the incidents reported in studies on pregnant women before the Covid-19 pandemic was done.

The study also looked at side effects of vaccines during pregnancy. Researchers have found that the most common side effect of the vaccine is pain at the injection site, which appears to be more common in pregnant recipients of vaccines. However, headaches, muscle aches, chills and fever were reported less frequently by pregnant women.

According to the researchers, more long-term studies are needed to evaluate the safety of the Covid-19 vaccine during pregnancy, and that this research should include the follow-up with a large population being vaccinated early in pregnancy.

“Continued monitoring is needed to further evaluate the maternal, gestational, neonatal and childhood outcomes associated with the vaccination of Covid-19 in mothers, including in earlier stages of pregnancy and during the period of prejudice,” the researchers wrote. “Meanwhile, the current data can help inform vaccination decision-making by pregnant women and their healthcare providers.”

Protection for mothers and newborns

In addition to being safe, research released last month showed that the mRNA Covid-19 vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer are also effective in protecting pregnant and lactating women – and their newborns. The study, published in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, which also used V-safe data, showed that mothers can transmit protective antibodies to newborns.

Researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard looked at 131 women who received the Pfizer / BioNTech or Moderna Covid-19 vaccine. Among the participants, 84 were pregnant, 31 were lactating and 16 were not pregnant or did not become lactating. Samples were collected between 17 December 2020 and 2 March 2021.

The vaccine-induced levels of antibodies were equivalent to pregnant and lactating women, compared to non-pregnant women. The antibody levels were ‘noticeably higher’ than those resulting from a coronavirus infection during pregnancy, the team noted.

“These vaccines seem to work incredibly effectively in these women,” said one of the researchers, Galit Alter, a professor of medicine at the Ragon Institute.

In addition, the team found that women transmitted protective antibodies to their newborns, measured in breast milk and the placenta. Alter said additional research is needed to understand how long the protective antibodies last in newborns.

While the team found similar antibody levels in women vaccinated with each vaccine, Alter said they found higher levels of IgA antibodies in pregnant women who received the Moderna vaccine. She said that these specific types of antibodies can be transmitted more effectively to babies over a longer period of time.

“There is some reason to think that higher levels of IgA immunity may be more protective,” Alter noted.

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