Covid pregnancy vaccine: safety for newborns and mothers

Vpreparation against Covid-19 and pregnancy: there has been a lot of talk about it and the fears of new mothers have not yet been completely quelled. To give, however, further confirmation that vaccination is not associated with any increase in risks for newborns is a new study by Swedish and Norwegian researchers, published in the journal JAMA.

Covid-19 vaccine during pregnancy: no increase in risks

The research, the largest so far to analyze the safety of vaccines in newborns whose mothers were immunized against Covid-19 during pregnancy, was conducted on almost 200,000 newborns in Sweden and Norway. Previous studies have shown that the serum does not cross the placenta and which is not found in umbilical cord blood. But the latter showed that children born to women who chose to get vaccinated they were even less likely to suffer serious complications, including death.

Research confirms

The scholars used the national registers of both countries and they included 98% of all newborns born to pregnant women after vaccines became available. All births from the twenty-second gestational week onwards were included in the study. The first baby was born in June 2021 and the last in January 2023. All the babies were followed for at least a month or until they were admitted to a neonatal unit.

Almost 200 thousand newborns studied

In total, the study included 196,470 newborns in which 48% of mothers had been vaccinated with one or more doses of mRNA vaccine against Covid-19. Nearly 80% had received the Pfizer vaccine and just over 20% the Moderna vaccine. In addition to lower infant mortality, the researchers also found a significantly lower risk of two other serious complications among newborns born to vaccinated mothers. In total, fifteen neonatal complications and conditions were studied.

The results

«We observed lower rates of cerebral hemorrhages and cerebral hypoxic-ischemic conditions in newborns of vaccinated mothers compared to those of mothers who were not vaccinated during pregnancy. While the incidence of other hemorrhages, blood clots or inflammation in various organ systems did not differ between the groups – emphasized Mikael Norman, professor of pediatrics and neonatalology at Karolinska Institutet and first author of the study. – Although the pandemic is over, The study and results are of great importance to healthcare professionals who offer advice, for authorities who issue recommendations and, above all, for anyone who becomes pregnant in the future.”

The safety of the vaccine during pregnancy is important

Covid-19 is still present in society and is probably something we will have to deal with for a long timetherefore, concludes Professor Norma «it is very important that the one hundred thousand women who become pregnant every year in Sweden, and the 130 million in the world, know that vaccination with the Covid vaccine during pregnancy is safe for their children. We did not find any increase in risks, if anything the newborns of vaccinated women had lower risks for some serious outcomes.”