Pfizer and Moderna Covid-19 vaccines are effective in pregnant women and infants, who can even transmit protective antibodies to newborns, according to research published Thursday in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
SCIENTISTS ANALYZED 131 WOMEN
The publication, released by the CNN chain, indicates that researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard, all of them in the United States, analyzed 131 women who received the aforementioned vaccines.
Among the study participants, 84 were pregnant, 31 were lactating, and 16 were not pregnant. The samples were collected between December 17, 2020 and March 2, 2021, adds the chain about the study.
Vaccine-induced antibody levels were equivalent in pregnant and lactating women compared to non-pregnant women.
In addition, the antibody levels were “surprisingly higher” than those resulting from coronavirus infection during pregnancy, the team noted.
“These vaccines appear to work incredibly effectively in these women,” said one of the researchers, Galit Alter, a professor of medicine at the Ragon Institute.
One in six adults in the United States is fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to the CDC.
In addition, the team found that women transmitted protective antibodies to their newborns, measured in breast milk and the placenta.
“Almost all the moms were getting quite a significant level of antibodies in their babies,” Alter said, adding that additional research is needed to understand how long those protective antibodies last in newborns.
Alter noted that they found no evidence of more side effects or more severe side effects in pregnant and lactating women than in the general population.