I think every woman of child-bearing age needs to know this - AIBU?

[reader12]

98.1% of pregnant women in hospital with COVID are unvaccinated.

98.7% of pregnant women with COVID in intensive care are unvaccinated. None of them have had two doses of the vaccine.

It feels like an emergency to me that everyone knows these figures and understands what they mean. As well as the horror of being ill and pregnant for each person going through it, the horror all the doctors and nurses are going through in dealing with this over and over again is totally avoidable.

Infographic with all the stats: www.npeu.ox.ac.uk/assets/downloads/MBRRACE-UK_Rapid_COVID_19_2021_-__Infographic_v10.pdf

More info on the source: www.npeu.ox.ac.uk/mbrrace-uk/news/2173-covid-19-in-pregnancy

@OnlyFoolsnMothers

Can I ask then, why when I went for my second vaccine was I asked if there was any chance of me being pregnant?

Primarily, because AZ isn’t advised for pregnant women and they need to make sure pregnant women are identified and given a different jab

And also to keep your vaccination record up to date
I had my second jab while pregnant. When I went for my booster, the doctor ran through the info on the screen which included that I was pregnant at my last one, and asked if I am still pregnant now (I am 37 weeks. It’s blindingly obvious I’m pregnant now)

so I had Pfizer

I do sympathise with pregnant women to a certain degree- I was pregnant in the first wave and I dont know if I would have chosen to be vaccinated then. I have a friend who's pregnant now and asking me what would I do, I said now I would as more data comes out.

I'd think it's important for everyone to know the current information on this topic because girls & women's health and issues within our health system - including clarity of information and data given by it - should matter to everyone.

I can see the argument that everyone involved or wanting to be involved in a pregnancy really needs to know the most up to date information on this because it's of concern to them, but it's a bit unreasonable to think that other women and girls of childbearing age not in that situation, particularly those of us with no intent on maintaining any future pregnancies, need to know this more than guys of the same age. I mean, we're already as vaccinated as we can get so really, why do I or my 14 year old DD need to know the stats on this more than the guys in our lives just because we could theoretically get pregnant?

I had covid while I was pregnant, but the jab wasn't a thing at that point, then it was advised not to have it while pregnant, which only changed after my baby was born. I think the changing advice will have made some women anxious, I'm glad I didn't have to make the choice.
My midwife also said it'd be interesting to see what effects, if any, the jab would have on women who then became pregnant and their babies when more people became eligible, which did make me think there was no way I was being a guinea pig while pregnant!
I am for vaccinations, in general, but I don't blame people for being hesitant.

YANBU

I am pregnant and faced a barage of unsolicited opinons on both sides of the fence... both arguments ultimately culminating in "why are you trying to kill your baby???"

I had my first at 2 weeks and my second vaccination at 20 weeks.
It was a hard choice but I am glad I made it.

@BeardyButton now why would you mention stillbirths when you must know how triggering that can be to someone when you have no clue about their past? That doesn't have anything to do with what I've said so I'm really not sure why you've mentioned that.
Nowhere did I say that pregnant women can't get Covid nor did I say where exactly I've done my research (so not sure how you've determined the sources I've read are not credible)

Your response has nothing to do with the effects on babies when the mother has taken the vaccine so not sure what your point was

@Chely

What is unreasonable is trying to scare women in to doing something they are not sure of.

I don't think this is about "scaring" women into doing something they are not sure of.

It's presenting unequivocal evidence of the risks pregnant women and their unborn children face by not being vaccinated.

And its not only the woman and child who are affected. The family, network, the healthcare staff who have to treat them etc are all affected by this. So its perfectly reasonable to present the evidence.

This is what the "my body my choice" brigade can't seem to grasp. It's not just your body. It's everyone else's body too.

@BiBabbles

I'd think it's important for everyone to know the current information on this topic because girls & women's health and issues within our health system - including clarity of information and data given by it - should matter to everyone.

I can see the argument that everyone involved or wanting to be involved in a pregnancy really needs to know the most up to date information on this because it's of concern to them, but it's a bit unreasonable to think that other women and girls of childbearing age not in that situation, particularly those of us with no intent on maintaining any future pregnancies, need to know this more than guys of the same age. I mean, we're already as vaccinated as we can get so really, why do I or my 14 year old DD need to know the stats on this more than the guys in our lives just because we could theoretically get pregnant?

Yes my title was badly worded - my thinking was that if you're at the age where pregnancy might be in your future, it's a much less stressful decision to get vaccinated before you become pregnant, rather than having to decide what to do about the vaccine once you are pregnant which is horrible, or risk the horrible outcomes of getting seriously ill with COVID while pregnant.

@thepeopleversuswork yes you're also taking a risk on behalf of everyone who would have to be involved in your care if you get ill, and they are all so tired.

I'm 39 weeks pregnant and unvaccinated, I've not taken that decision lightly and have gone backwards and forwards on what to do. I'm in a fortunate situation where I can isolate, work from home and I have no other children to care for.
No professional that I have seen during my pregnancy has asked about whether I'd had the vaccine, my community midwife, consultants, other midwives, even my own gp, no one. But they have asked about flu vaccine and whooping cough vaccine. There are no factual posters up in the clinics etc. The information isn't readily available, at least in my area, to allow women to make a decision with the help of professional guidance. Only the info that I've found online about the pros and cons and ultimately having to make the decision myself. It's so easy to say what you would or wouldn't do, but until you're in that situation and have to decide for you and baby who can blame women for being a bit hesitant.

It’s triggering for a reason. Informing yourself on risks of getting the vacc should include informing yourself on risks of NOT getting the vacc. 2 sides of same coin, esp given current rates of transmission.

YANBU
I was on the fence about going for booster, and having had pregnant friends over the summer postpone their jab / 2nd jab after advice I was going to follow suit.
But then I just randomly googled covid jab when pregnant and found this updated info. This should definitely be highlighted more in media as it could save lives l, I am now going for booster as soon as I’m eligible.

I think a lot of the problem has come from the mixed messages, I'm 38weeks with my 2nd, I had my first dose of the AZ vaccine in March, and had my 2nd dose booked.

I found out I was pregnant about a month after my first dose and immediately asked both my midwife midwife and my consultant if I should have the 2nd dose, I was told not to because I'd had the AZ vaccine and as I was pregnant they couldn't offer me the 2nd dose as an alternative vaccine.

@Tartanblankets that's actually really shocking that no doctors or anyone talked to you about it.

But you will get someone on here soon saying those statistics are meaningless because they don’t show how many unvaccinated pregnant women have caught Covid and not been hospitalised.

Which is a pretty relevant piece of information. If a million unvaccinated pregnant women have Covid with no ill effects, but one ends up in ICU, that makes the odds a million to one.

Another useful statistic is, what percentage of people in hospital are unvaccinated pregnant women?

Being unvaccinated is a risk for anyone. Whether it is more of a risk for pregnant women is unclear from these statistics.

Surely the answer, as always, is get vaccinated.

The reason there's so much anxiety around this is due to the fact that women are always an after-thought in medical science, and particularly pregnant women. The conflicting advice given to so many pregnant women - even now - is a direct result of this. We desperately need a system of medical trials that explicitly considers women, pregnant women, and men and women from different ethnic backgrounds, because at the moment it really doesn't.

I'm not surprised pregnant women are anxious. However, the data now does present a very clear picture of the risks to them.

My understanding is that during the third trimester the immune system 'damps down' its response, so that the immune system doesn't view the baby as an 'alien'. This, along with changes to the respiratory system caused by late-stage pregnancy, makes pregnant women far more vulnerable to infections like COVID. It's why flu jabs have been recommended for a very long time for pregnant women. But we're not told this basic information, are we? If we were, then I am sure many pregnant women would understand their risk much more, and thus be more minded to take the vaccinations on offer.

There's loads published that explain just why pregnant women are at such risk. This is just one paper: www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fgwh.2021.602572/full

Thank you for bringing this up. I don’t think it is scaremongering at all. And the purpose of my post is not to scaremonger either, but to provide our experiences in intensive care.

We currently have two unvaccinated women on our intensive care and have had many many more come through the unit during the pandemic, two have died. These women in general have been extremely sick, have had to give birth prematurely (with all the risks to their child that prematurity can involve), have been intubated, sent for specialist ECMO services etc.

Where we could ask them, most of them have complained that the advice hasn’t been clear with anecdotal reports that their midwifery teams have not been encouraging of them vaccine. This is something our obstetric teams are trying to address.

Personally I feel for pregnant women who have a barrage of information thrown at them with regards to things they cannot do, cannot eat etc in pregnancy. I avoided highlights in my hair in my first trimester!

But the fact that all the women in our intensive care (and those units in our region) have all been unvaccinated is a clear sign that vaccination keeps you from being seriously unwell.

None of these women thought it would happen to them and are devastated that they are separated from their babies, that their babies are sick etc…

It is heartbreaking to look after these women who would very likely not even come near intensive care if they’d had the vaccine.

@Thecurliestwurly

Just out of curiosity (not pregnant myself) how have the long term risks to mother and baby been tested and are these well known?

I think as it is a new vaccine and we haven't been able to study long, long term effects (development of the child, etc) this might be what puts some pregnant women off. No vaccine is 100% safe (obviously the risk of COVID complications is higher). For some people putting something in their body which might, in their eyes, l lead to harm will feel more anxiety inducing than risking getting COVID and possibly being ok. I think this is why some pregnant women don't come forward and I expect this will improve over time.

I think what you have said here explains the whole problem with lack of education.

The whole point of a vaccine is that it is putting a mild version or deactivated version of a virus into your body. It then provokes an immune response in your own body. This immune response is created out of cells already within your body, in exactly the same way as you create immune cells and immunity for any other virus you have that you don’t get vaccinated for

The original antigens, the viral bits, in the vaccine are killed by the immune cells you create. Therefore there is no”vaccine” kleptocracy in your body. All that’s left is your own immune cells.

This is 9ne of the beautiful things about a vaccine. Side affects are actually low generally, and long term side effects are extremely rare . Most side effects either arise in the first few minutes and hours of inoculation when the virus is in your body but your immune response is still developing, or as a rare even tap of side effects of the actual inoculation (as with bleeds).

I think people misunderstand that the vaccine itself stays in your body for years - it doesn’t …a matter of a few days. This is why long term side effects are so rare.

Bonkers really

I don't think the advice in this area has been clear enough, I know someone who had a baby in the last 6 months who was advised not to have the vaccine during pregnancy. They were not the only one.

You must remember when looking at the stats that in Feb this year, almost all women of childbearing age had not yet been offered their first vaccine and it was several months until they were. I think things are changing now pregnant people are actually being offered the vaccine.

I really think that pregnant people should be considered high risk and be prioritised for booster jabs etc...

Where we could ask them, most of them have complained that the advice hasn’t been clear with anecdotal reports that their midwifery teams have not been encouraging of them vaccine. This is something our obstetric teams are trying to address.

That's really pretty disturbing, as are the mixed messages around vaccination and pregnant women.

It's really shocking that midwives have been discouraging women from having the vaccine. Do you have any idea why that is?

@Warblerinwinter that's so helpful, thank you. I do think most of us (me included) don't know how vaccines work, so yours is a really helpful, easy to understand, explanation. It's really reassuring.

@BoredZelda

But you will get someone on here soon saying those statistics are meaningless because they don’t show how many unvaccinated pregnant women have caught Covid and not been hospitalised.

Which is a pretty relevant piece of information. If a million unvaccinated pregnant women have Covid with no ill effects, but one ends up in ICU, that makes the odds a million to one.

Another useful statistic is, what percentage of people in hospital are unvaccinated pregnant women?

Being unvaccinated is a risk for anyone. Whether it is more of a risk for pregnant women is unclear from these statistics.

Surely the answer, as always, is get vaccinated.

Don’t think anyone is saying they are more at risk of getting covid. The issue is that if you are pregnant you have additional risks of complications.

[quote eyeslikebutterflies]@Warblerinwinter that's so helpful, thank you. I do think most of us (me included) don't know how vaccines work, so yours is a really helpful, easy to understand, explanation. It's really reassuring.[/quote]
And that’s the governments fault- these explanations should be going into sites likes mumsnet, tv main channels and subscription tv etc etc….it makes me seethe that some money spent on this would save lives.

I'm still unwell 4 months after my second jab though, I worry I'll never be the same again.