Less than half of pregnant women get the flu shot
synchronicity to the timing of these vaccines.
The Williams research team found influenza vaccines to be most effective in protecting infants when administered during the third trimester, which is also when the highest rates of influenza-related hospitalizations among pregnant women are observed.
The extra risk for pregnant women during flu season, especially during their third trimesters, is twofold, Williams said.
First, pregnant women are immunocompromised —their immune systems are on a slight break — as a way to protect the developing baby. Otherwise, the body could view this new being as an invader worth attacking.
The downside of that phenomenon is moms having fewer weapons to fight actual invaders, like the flu.
Second, even in healthy, influenza-free moms, the third trimester is accompanied by long, slow, non-romantic walks up the stairs as the growing baby impinges on space usually occupied by expanding lungs.
Anything that impairs the lungs’ ability to fully inflate is a risk for pneumonia (or worsening upper-respiratory symptoms).
Because those causes are unalterable aspects of pregnancy, physicians like Williams are determined to increase the uptake of influenza vaccine among the pregnant population in a different way: open, honest conversation.
“We certainly have seen more hesitancy since COVID-19 where people question vaccination,” Williams said. “In the medical profession, we welcome questions. I would love to give you facts about the vaccines.
“Flu vaccines, for instance, are entirely, entirely safe. It’s one of the safest vaccines known. It’s virtually unchanged for 50 years. We have decades of experience with it in hundreds of millions of patients.”
He hopes the data published by his team last month can serve as educational ammunition toward broadening moms’ understanding of the influenza vaccine’s purpose — to include their developing babies — which could translate into more pregnant women choosing to get the flu shot.
And he calls on new babies’ family members to join the cause, as his own story of hanging up his hog now becomes a parable for how to support young families.
“The best way to protect our very young children and infants is for everyone around them to be vaccinated. We call that cocooning,” he said. “Even if people feel like, ‘I’m willing to take my chances,’ are you willing to take chances with the baby, or do you want to protect them?
“Just get a darn flu shot.”