COVID 19 Vaccine And Pregnancy | Is The Covid Vaccine Safe For Pregnancy?
Should you, or should you not get a COVID vaccine?
According to the Centers For Disease Control, COVID vaccinations are optional for pregnant women, but you should be aware of risks and benefits.
What is your risk if you contract COVID while pregnant?
Pregnant women aren't more likely to get COVID than non-pregnant people, but they are more likely to get sicker if they get COVID than if they weren't pregnant. They're more likely to experience respiratory compromise or be more severely ill. And their babies are more likely to be born prematurely or to weigh less at birth.
So what exactly is the COVID vaccine and why is it safe in pregnancy when for instance, you shouldn't get a chickenpox vaccine or a rubella vaccine?
What makes the COVID vaccine safe during pregnancy?
You should not get live vaccines in pregnancy if possible. The COVID vaccine is not a live virus. Instead, the COVID vaccine is an mRNA vaccine.
It doesn't contain any live virus, so you can't get COVID from getting a COVID vaccine and you can't pass COVID to your baby. The benefit of receiving the COVID vaccine is that it stimulates antibody production. If you receive a COVID vaccine, your baby will be born with some passive immunity. Passive immunity means that some of your antibodies pass to the fetus. The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are RNA vaccines. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is not an RNA vaccine. It's a viral vector vaccine, and means they use a vector or a pre-version of the COVID virus to stimulate antibody production. And although pregnant women were excluded from clinical trials, we know a lot about other RNA vaccines and about vector vaccines.
One of the vector vaccines that was recently developed was for Ebola. Remember when Ebola was the biggest infection worry in the world? The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are given in two doses, three or four weeks apart. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is a single dose vaccine with a little bit lower stimulation of immunity, which means it's slightly less effective.
Participating in the V-safe registry can help.
All of these vaccines are considered to be safe in pregnancy. If you receive any of them, I encourage you to participate in the V-safe registry. You'll get a text message every day for the first week or two, and then you'll start getting them again after your second dose if you receive the Pfizer or the Moderna vaccines. The texts contain a little questionnaire and it's very easy to complete. You will get through it in 30 to 60 seconds.
You'll get questions like:
Are you experiencing a fever or chills?
Have you missed any work because of the vaccine?
Are you pregnant?
Have you had any other symptoms of COVID?
They'll keep checking in with you and then a few weeks after you receive your vaccine, you'll get another little questionnaire. Please participate in this, because it helps develop information about the safety of the vaccine, especially if you're pregnant, breastfeeding, or planning a pregnancy. There's no evidence that the vaccine causes any harm to moms or babies. If you're breastfeeding, it does not appear to affect your milk supply.
What happens if you receive the COVID vaccine and then become pregnant?
If you need a live vaccine like rubella (German measles), we recommend waiting a few months after you get that vaccine before becoming pregnant. We don't make that recommendation for the COVID vaccine, because it doesn't contain live virus. So if you've received the COVID vaccine and you become pregnant right away, no worries.
I have personally had COVID and then had the Pfizer COVID vaccine. I experienced some body aches, but nothing that Tylenol didn't fix. Side effects of the vaccine range from none at all to a low-grade fever, body aches, and chills. You may feel a little fluey for a few days. Any symptoms tend to be mild and transient.
Almost all our pregnant patients ask if they should receive the COVID vaccine. If you're a healthcare worker, or if you work around a lot of people every day, your risk may be higher for getting COVID. In this case, you should strongly consider getting the vaccine.
Even if you're mostly at home, you still have some risk of getting COVID, so consider getting vaccinated. Do some reading for yourself on cdc.gov.
In conclusion
I hope this was helpful because I know this is a question on everybody's mind. Make your own decision, and remember that there's no right or wrong answer. The decision that you're comfortable with for you, your baby, and your family is the right one.
Please leave me a comment or question below. I read all my comments and will be happy to help in any way that I can!