Do pregnant women need to be vaccinated with COVID-19?Immunologists answer three questions

I am a doctor and got the first shot of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine. Credits: William Petri, CC BY-SA

This week I was vaccinated with COVID-19 with Pfizer mRNA vaccine. This raised some frequently asked questions about the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.

I am a professor of infectious diseases The University of Virginia cares for patients with COVID-19 and is researching the best ways to prevent, diagnose, and treat this new infection. As I was interacting with patients at the hospital, some mothers and pregnant women asked if it was safe to vaccinate. This is what I told them.

1) Can I get vaccinated if I am pregnant or breastfeeding?

Yes, if you are pregnant or breastfeeding, you can get the COVID-19 vaccine.

The important reason is that COVID-19 becomes more severe during pregnancy. In a study of 23,000 pregnant women with symptomatological COVID-19The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that pregnant women were three and 2.9 times more likely to enter the ICU or ventilator, respectively. However, I am reassured that the absolute risk remains low. About 1 in 100 pregnant women I will be admitted to the ICU with COVID-19.

Vaccines are generally Safety and tolerability during pregnancy..

Neither the Pfizer vaccine nor the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine contains the live SARS-CoV-2 virus, so there is no risk of pregnant women or the fetus developing COVID-19. These vaccines are safe for another reason. The mRNA used in both vaccines to stimulate the protective immune response does not enter the cell’s nucleus. This means that it does not interact with the DNA that encodes the human genome of the mother or fetal.

The caveat is the lack of safety data for the COVID-19 vaccine because pregnant women were deliberately excluded in a phase 3 trial. modern And Pfizer vaccine.

If there are no clinical trial data on Pfizer and Moderna vaccines in pregnant and lactating women, but these vaccines are expected to be safe in these populations. Both CDCs And that American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists Vaccination is recommended to be a personal decision Female People who are pregnant.

for Pregnant woman If you decide to vaccinate, fever associated with vaccination should be treated with acetaminophen, as fever is associated with adverse consequences of pregnancy.

Yes No worries that the vaccine will interfere with breastfeeding If you are breastfeeding, there is no reason not to get vaccinated.

2) Is it protected from asymptomatic infections?

Initial data show 60% protection from asymptomatic infections after the first dose of Moderna mRNA vaccine. Pfizer may also protect against asymptomatic infections, but this has not yet been shown. This means that the risk of developing an asymptomatic infection is reduced by more than half after the first dose of the Moderna vaccine.

Subjects in the Phase 3 study collected a nasal swab during the second dose of the vaccine.Of these, 14 out of 15,000 volunteers in the vaccine group, and Placebo Group We experienced an asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection called asymptomatic COVID-19.

This is proof of that Asymptomatic infections are prevented Even after the first dose. This is great news. vaccineInduced protection from asymptomatic infection Promotes herd immunity and the end of the pandemic.

3) Will the new version of SARS-CoV-2 virus succumb to the vaccine?

Fortunately, all versions of the SARS-CoV-2 virus identified so far Neutralized by COVID-19 vaccine..

The main way these vaccines work is to prevent external spike proteins. Coronavirus From attachment of human cells to the ACE2 protein.

Vaccines do this by triggering the human immune system to produce anti-spike antibodies that attach and neutralize the virus each time they encounter a spike protein.

All 17 versions of the virus tested so far have been neutralized, including the most common variants in the United States.

The· New variant of the UK Despite the presence of mutations in spike glycoproteins, they can spread more easily from person to person and are less likely to avoid new vaccines. This is partly due to the fact that the antibody has multiple sites on the peplomer that can be targeted to neutralize the virus. This is currently officially tested.

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