Studies have shown that the COVID-19 vaccine did not affect the placenta during pregnancy | Mcclatchy

Chicago — New data from researchers studying women vaccinated during pregnancy found no evidence that the vaccine affected their placenta.

A new finding published in the Obstetrics & Gynecology Journal on Tuesday shifts focus from conversations about whether vaccines are safe during pregnancy to conversations about how vaccination is a way to protect mothers and babies. May be useful for.

Dr. Emily Miller, a physician in maternal-fetal medicine at co-author Northwestern Medicine, said the findings were encouraging.

“There is no signal that the vaccine has damaged the placenta,” Miller said. “This is based on rapidly emerging data that emphasizes that vaccines are not dangerous during pregnancy.”

Obstetrics and gynecology studies have increased evidence that the COVID-19 vaccine is safe during pregnancy, the researchers said. It is also believed that the COVID-19 vaccine was the first to investigate the effect on the placenta. This indicates a potential risk and can be an early sign of a problem.

“The placenta is like a black box on an airplane,” co-author Dr. Jeffrey Goldstein, an assistant professor of pathology at Northwestern University’s Fineberg School of Medicine, said in a statement accompanying the study. “If something goes wrong during pregnancy, there are usually changes in the placenta that help us understand what happened.”

From what they saw, he added, “COVID vaccines do not damage the placenta.”

Dr. Jessica O’Connell was one of the first to be vaccinated during pregnancy and was an early qualified physician at Northwestern University. She gave birth to her son in January at the Northwestern Medicine Prentice Women’s Hospital.

She said she was confident in her ability to understand the science behind vaccines and “no doubt” about vaccination, and to weigh risk and benefit scenarios. Looking at this study reinforces her decision.

“It’s always safe to have real data to support your hypothesis,” she said. “Of course, I definitely don’t want to do anything that could harm my child. OK, it’s also a great relief to have data showing that there is no effect at the cellular molecular level.”

Since the vaccine became available, maternity health professionals have worked to give advice to pregnant women. Pregnant and lactating women were not included in the initial COVID-19 vaccine trial. That is, when the vaccine became available, the family was making decisions about the new vaccine without data specific to pregnancy. By citing pregnancy as a health problem that may increase the risk of being infected with COVID-19, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has made vaccines available to pregnant women early.

“There was a difficult battle to get data quickly and reassure people that it’s okay to vaccinate during pregnancy by excluding pregnant people from the original vaccine trial,” Miller said. Says.

The data remained limited enough that Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) Recently sent a letter to the CDC asking Congress to provide more information and help guide pregnant women’s decisions. ..

A lot of false information is spreading around vaccines and childbirth. Goldstein also said the Internet has exacerbated concerns that vaccines could provoke an immune response and cause mothers to reject the foetation, and these results are inconsistent.

The study collected placenta from 84 vaccinated and 116 unvaccinated patients. Most vaccinated patients were vaccinated with Moderna or Pfizer vaccines late in pregnancy (from the 28th week of pregnancy).

A potential effect on pregnancy is infection with COVID-19. Pregnant women have been shown to be at increased risk of serious illness when infected with COVID-19. A previous study by researchers at Northwestern and Lurie Children’s Hospital showed that the placenta of a woman who tested positive for the virus showed evidence of damage such as abnormal blood flow between the mother and baby in the womb. I understand.

Researchers also published a study in April showing that vaccinated pregnant women make COVID-19 antibodies and successfully transfer them to the foetation. This provides the only way for them to obtain COVID-19 antibodies until the infants can be vaccinated.