America’s only dual expert in fertility and virology has definitive answers.
Doctors across the country are reporting an alarming trend in their ICUs as of late: a surge in pregnant women becoming critically ill with Covid-19.
While hard data on this is still being compiled, one doctor at the University of Alabama’s Birmingham Division of Maternal-Fetal Medicine told NBC that she and her colleagues estimate they’re seeing triple (or possibly even quadruple) the number of pregnant Covid patients than they’ve had earlier in the pandemic. Medical centers in Tennessee and North Carolina have reported similar experiences.
Current CDC guidance for moms-to-be says that not only is the vaccine proven to be safe during pregnancy, but getting the shot while you’re expecting is highly encouraged. And now that the FDA has officially approved Pfizer’s vaccine as of this week, with a similar clearance expected soon for Moderna and Johnson & Johnson, all the experts agree there should be no reservations about the adverse effects of getting a shot while you’re carrying a baby.
Still, the CDC reports only 23 percent of pregnant women have been fully vaccinated, so clearly, the worries are still unresolved for many of them.
To clear things up, we checked in with Dr. Cindy M. Duke, who is uniquely positioned to speak on this topic. As the only dual expert on both fertility and virology in the United States, she’s literally the best possible expert you could go to with these questions. Here’s what Dr. Duke had to say when we asked her to separate fact from fiction.
Can the vaccine affect fertility?
If you got Covid-19 and ended up landing in the hospital needing oxygen or having damage to your lungs or heart, that has a way more negative impact on your future chances of a successful and safe pregnancy. The risk of miscarriage or pregnancy loss is high from the Covid-19 infection itself, and not from the vaccine.
We had information on prior versions of the coronavirus to inform us, and that was what we’ve built on for not only our clinical information but for designing our vaccine. It’s also part of why we were able to sequence the code of this SARS-CoV-2 virus so quickly. We were quickly able to compare it to the older coronavirus outbreaks, look at the code, and see what was different, hence the word SARS-CoV-2, which distinguishes this current outbreak from the one that we saw in 2003.
A rumor has circulated suggesting that the spike protein for the coronavirus actually is identical to a protein called syncytin-1, which is one of the proteins on the placenta. There was a suggestion that those antibodies against the spike protein can then go on to attack a pregnancy. However, that is completely flawed. It’s not based on science, and it actually isn’t based on how antibodies work.
Why weren’t pregnant women included in the vaccine clinical trials?
The truth is this is based on historical reference when it comes to research trials: Someone who is pregnant is considered to be high risk for exploitation. So we first have to determine safety of the vaccine candidate — safety in humans — before we use it in someone who’s pregnant. But they’ve since now been included, and people who received the vaccine went on to achieve pregnancy and deliver babies.
Can you breastfeed if you’ve gotten the vaccine?
It’s safe to get the vaccine while you’re breastfeeding. And similarly, if you got the vaccine while pregnant, which is our recommendation, it actually helps you procure antibodies that can not only cross the placenta and protect your unborn baby and help them have immunity against Covid-19 once they’re born, but it will also continue to be present in your breast milk if you’re either lactating and breastfeeding or lactating and pumping.
