NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) — As moms-to-be work to navigate the COVID-19 pandemic, they are faced with ever-changing research and tough decisions on how to respond.
“There’s a lot of worries on a lot of moms’ minds,” said Christin McAuliffe, who has a toddler and is expecting her second child in mid-April. “My personal safety, the safety of my children, and the question of how do we interact in a society when we can’t see each other?”
The Tennessee Department of Health announced Phase 1c will include pregnant persons and their household members who are 16 years and older.
This comes after initial research showed a COVID-19 vaccine might not be safe for expectant mothers.
“Unfortunately, pregnant women were excluded from those initial studies looking at vaccine development for the COVID vaccine,” said Dr. Jennifer Thompson, associate professor of Maternal Fetal Medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. “However, we are gaining more and more information. There were a handful of women who inadvertently became pregnant during those initial vaccine studies… but, from their experience, we haven’t seen adverse outcomes.”
While the research is still extremely limited, doctors say they do know pregnant patients have an increased risk of severe COVID-19 disease.
“Otherwise healthy women, just by being pregnant, have an increased risk of hospitalization, ICU admission, need for mechanical ventilation and a slight increase of death compared to non-pregnant individuals. And, then when you add on pre-existing health conditions that risk can increase as well,” Dr. Thompson explained.
For McAuliffe, the risk of catching COVID and possibly becoming severely ill from it persuaded her to get vaccinated.
“I have to be alive for my toddler more than anything,” said McAuliffe. “When I actually took the vaccine I held up a picture — not just of my ultrasound, but also my toddler because I was doing it for both of them.”
The CDC announced a new research program that will look at the effects of COVID-19 on pregnant women and their babies from pregnancy to childhood.
