Midwives ‘risking lives with jab scare stories’

MIDWIVES are putting the health of pregnant women at risk by telling them not to get the Covid jab, vaccine experts have warned.

Maternity staff across the NHS are also putting their patients in danger of suffering premature or stillbirths with unfounded scare stories about the jabs, medics say.

The alarm has been sounded after data showed a worrying rise in unvaccinated mums- to- be being admitted to hospital. One intensive care doctor from a Midlands hospital said roughly ten per cent of their patients were pregnant women.

A poll of 9,000 British pregnant women – revealed to The Mail on Sunday – showed that more than three-quarters had not been urged to take the jab by maternity staff.

Yet expectant mothers who catch Covid are three times as likely to end up in intensive care as nonvulnerable people, and three times more likely to experience premature birth, which can put the baby’s life at risk.

Pregnant Labour MP Stella Creasy, 44, says she was advised against the jab. She said: ‘A midwife told me I was taking a risk by having it. I was pretty taken aback. I told her I would do my own research.’ She has now had both jabs.

The Government initially said it would not advise vaccinating pregnant women, as they had not been included in clinical trials.

But in April, after data from more than 130,000 US women showed the jab was safe and effective, that stance was reversed.

Gill Walton, chief executive of the Royal College of Midwives, said the college’s strong recommendation is for pregnant women to get the vaccine as soon as they are able to.