Spike in COVID-19+ pregnant women
MBABANE – An increase in the number of pregnant women who experienced severe COVID-19 disease has also been noted in the country.
This was confirmed by Dr Vusi Magagula, Director of Health Services in the Ministry of Health, following a recent finding by researchers that COVID-19 during pregnancy was not only linked to severe illness, but birth complications as well.
Dr Magagula stated that those who had experienced severe disease were particularly those in early pregnancy.
“The ministry ended up developing guidelines of management of COVID-19 in pregnancy as a result. It was clearly evident when fast progression into severe disease on those pregnant at the time and there was need to share this with all practitioners,” he said.
The director of health services mentioned that at the time of questioning the statistics on the topic were not in his possession.
The BBC recently reported that Scottish researchers found that women who caught the virus near the end of pregnancy were more vulnerable to birth-related complications.
However, women who caught the virus in either stage of pregnancy were bound to experience severe disease, including early pregnancy.
“Women who catch COVID-19 during late pregnancy are more likely to suffer birth complications than women who catch COVID-19 in early pregnancy or not at all,” stated the findings of the study.
The researchers said getting vaccinated was crucial to protect pregnant women and their babies from life-threatening complications.
The latest findings come from one of the first national studies of pregnancy and COVID-19.
“They found that preterm births, stillbirths and newborn deaths were more common among women who had the virus 28 days, or less, before their delivery date.”
Complications
The majority of complications are said to occur in unvaccinated women.
The results, which have been published in Nature Medicine, come after recent data showed 98 per cent of pregnant women admitted to United Kingdom intensive care units with coronavirus symptoms were unvaccinated.
Researchers are now calling for measures to increase vaccine uptake in pregnant women. The study included more than 87 000 women who were pregnant between the start of vaccination uptake in December 2020 and October 2021.
Vaccination uptake was lower in pregnant women during the study period, compared with women aged 18 to 44 in the general population.
Just 32 per cent of women who gave birth in October 2021 were fully vaccinated, compared with 77 per cent of the general female population aged 18 to 44.
All of the women whose babies died had not been vaccinated against COVID-19 at the time of infection, though experts stressed that it was not possible to say if the virus contributed directly to the deaths or preterm births as they did not have access to detailed clinical records for individual women.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), the precautions pregnant women should take against COVID-19 include getting vaccinated, keeping space between yourself and other people, and avoiding crowded spaces, keeping rooms well-ventilated, wearing a mask where it is not possible to keep sufficient physical distance from others, washing your hands frequently with an alcohol-based sanitiser or soap and water and practicing respiratory hygiene.
This means covering your mouth and nose with your bent elbow or tissue when you cough or sneeze, then disposing of the used tissue immediately.