Do Covid-19 and its vaccines adversely affect breast milk?

The Covid-19 pandemic has influenced every aspect of human life.

With the baby still arriving in the world, the appropriate questions raised by the mother or future mother revolve around the issue of breastfeeding regarding Covid-19 vaccination and infection.

The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that breastfeeding begin within the first hour of life and continue until the child is at least 2 years old. This is because the benefits last for a long time.

Multiple benefits

Breastfeeding benefits babies and mothers.

However, only about one-third of the world’s babies are breast-fed for six months. This percentage hasn’t changed for 20 years.

Breast milk is an ideal food for babies.

The ideal first milk, first milk, helps the baby’s gastrointestinal development.

Vitamin D is the only food that may be deficient in breast milk. This can easily be improved by the mother taking vitamin D.

Breast milk is safe, clean and contains antibodies that protect it from viruses and bacteria. This is an important childhood need.

This is especially true for dairy milk, which is high in immunoglobulin A (IgA) and other antibodies.

After being exposed to viruses and bacteria, these antibodies are produced by the mother and transferred to the milk produced by the mother.

Therefore, breastfeeding reduces the risk of many infections in babies.

Breast milk also provides all the energy and nutrient requirements of an infant in the first few months of life.

It continues to provide about half of such requirements in the second half of the first year of life and about one-third in the second year of life.

Breast milk promotes healthy weight gain while helping prevent obesity in children.

Breastfeeding for more than 4 months has been reported to significantly reduce overweight and obese babies.

This is due to the high amount of beneficial gut bacteria that can affect fat accumulation.

Breast-fed babies are also high in leptin, a hormone that regulates appetite and fat accumulation.

Breastfeeding has a positive effect on the long-term brain development of the baby.

Breast-fed children get better on intelligence tests and are less likely to develop behavioral problems and learning disabilities as they get older.

This effect is most pronounced in preterm infants, who are prone to developmental problems.

There are also significant benefits for breastfeeding mothers.

Breastfeeding burns calories, helping to bond mothers and children and restore weight before pregnancy.

Breastfeeding promotes uterine contractions to their previous size (retraction) through the production of the hormone oxytocin, which increases during pregnancy, childbirth, and breastfeeding.

Breastfeeding mothers generally have less blood loss and faster regression.

It also reduces the chances of developing postpartum depression (PPD), which can occur shortly after childbirth.

Mothers with PPD are more likely to have problems with breastfeeding and have a shorter duration of breastfeeding.

In addition, breastfeeding reduces the risk of several illnesses, including breast and ovarian cancer, high blood pressure, heart disease, type 2 diabetes, high blood lipids (fats), and arthritis.

Continuous breastfeeding prevents ovulation and menstruation.

This may be a natural way to ensure a time lag between pregnancies.

However, it is important for breastfeeding mothers to use contraception within 6 months of delivery. This is because the effect on ovulation then diminishes.

Covid-19 vaccine and breastfeeding

Evidence of the safety and efficacy of Covid-19 vaccination during pregnancy continues to grow, with data suggesting that its benefits outweigh the known or potential risks.

Reports from clinical trials of the Covid-19 vaccine currently in use did not include lactating mothers.

As a result, limited data are available on the safety of vaccines in breastfeeding mothers, their effects on breastfeeding babies, and their effects on breast milk production and excretion.

However, you can rely on basic virological principles.

mRNA (messenger ribonucleic acid) vaccines (eg Pfizer / BioNTech), vector-based vaccines (eg AstraZeneca / Oxford), and inactivated vaccines (eg Sinovac) do not cause infections in recipients, including mothers and babies. Hmm.

These vaccines are effective in reducing the risk of severe illness, hospitalization, and death, and indirectly prevent the spread of Covid-19.

Therefore, based on virological principles, the Covid-19 vaccine is not contraindicated among pregnant or lactating mothers.

Breastfeeding mothers who have been vaccinated with the mRNA Covid-19 vaccine have recently reported antibodies to their milk that can protect their babies.

However, more data is needed to determine the protection that these antibodies may provide to the baby.

Current data also suggest that mRNA vaccines are preferred for breastfeeding mothers.

If you do not have access to the mRNA vaccine, you can consider a vector-based vaccine.

None of the current Covid-19 vaccines are live vaccines, but live vaccines are generally contraindicated during pregnancy and lactation.

The jury is still considering mixing different types of vaccines and intervals.

It is a good clinical practice to administer a similar type of vaccine, especially to pregnant and lactating individuals, until further evidence is available.

Covid-19 and breastfeeding

Current guidelines from the WHO, the United Nations International Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and specialized agencies have so far continued breastfeeding even if the mother is infected with Covid-19. Is recommended.

Their basis is the overall short-term and long-term immunological and psychological benefits of breastfeeding.

There are comprehensible concerns about the baby safety of Covid-19 mothers and the pros and cons of discontinuing breastfeeding.

However, regulatory and expert recommendations now state that there is insufficient evidence of breastfeeding Covid-19 infection.

Therefore, strict mother-infant separation and discontinuation of breastfeeding should be avoided, regardless of positive diagnosis or severity of symptoms.

If the mother is ill and unable to care for the baby, the baby should be fed fresh, non-pasteurized milk.

A review titled “Breastfeeding and COVID-19: From Nutrition to Immunity” on April 7 (2021) Immunology Frontier Scientists say: “SIgA, the most abundant antibody in breast milk, provides adequate specific protection against pathogens such as viruses.

“The specificity of sIgA is determined by the mother’s immune response to previous infections, probably with low or mild symptoms of SARS-CoV-infected mothers’ milk-fed infants. Explains that there is.

“Further research is needed to accumulate knowledge about anti-SARS-CoVsIgA produced through newborn breastfeeding.”

If you are a breastfeeding mother infected with Covid-19 and have any doubts about continuing to breastfeed, talk to your doctor.

Dr. Milton Lam is a former president of the Federation of Private Healthcare Workers Associations and the Malaysian Medical Association. For more information, please email starhealth @ thestar.com.my. The expressed views do not represent the views of the organization to which the writer is associated. The information provided is for educational and communication purposes only and should not be construed as personal medical advice. The information published in this article is not intended to replace, replace, or reinforce your own healthcare professional consultation. Star We are not liable for any direct or indirect loss, property damage or personal injury caused by our reliance on such information.