If the mother-to-be gets the new crown vaccine, will the baby also have antibodies?

Pregnant mother eats walnut baby brain melon spirit, pregnant mother eats grape baby eye bright, pregnant mother eats sesame baby hair black... Pregnant mothers are vaccinated, can the baby be free of poison?

Scientists at Massachusetts General Hospital and the Ragon Institute have confirmed this association with scientific research - antibodies produced by pregnant mothers vaccinating against the new crown can be detected in umbilical cord blood, detected in newborns, and can also make babies resistant to the new crown virus. The paper was published Feb. 7 in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).

Pregnant mothers can give their children two antibodies

It is well known that the nutrients ingested by pregnant mothers will be passed on to the baby, so can antibodies also be transmitted?

"There are two types of antibodies that mothers pass to their babies, fetal antibodies and milk antibodies." An expert who did not want to be named told the Science and Technology Daily reporter that the former actively excreted into the fetal blood circulation through the placenta, the latter entered the baby's body through breast milk, and both antibodies are beneficial to the baby's ability to learn to resist pathogens. Antibodies to infectious diseases such as influenza and hepatitis B have been shown to be passed from mother to baby.

So, are fetal and milk antibodies indispensable?

An interesting animal test gave the answer.

A company has previously conducted a "nest change" study when studying the hand-foot-and-mouth disease vaccine. Four female mice, two groups were vaccinated and two groups were not vaccinated. After the young mice are born, they choose to be fed interchangeably with a nest of un-vaccinated suckling rats, and the other two litters do not move. After that, the protective power of fetal-transmitted antibodies and milk-borne antibodies was compared from the pathogenesis and mortality of each nest of suckling mice by attacking enterovirus type 71 virus in four litters of suckling mice.

Schematic of the "Nest Changing" study. Courtesy of the researchers

It was found that both fetal and milk antibodies produce a certain degree of protection, but when both are present, the young mice can survive the virus attack, and the protective power is 100%.

Covid-19 antibodies can also be transmitted

After the emergence of the new crown virus, people's research on new crown virus antibodies has become more and more in-depth, and many studies have begun to prove that new crown virus antibodies can be transmitted to babies through two channels.

As early as March 2020, scholars at the Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University analyzed the antibodies in the body of many pregnant women infected with the new crown virus and the newborns they gave birth to. The results showed that the newborns carried antibodies to the new crown virus, but were not infected with the new crown virus and did not develop symptoms.

Since 2021, multiple reports from Turkey and Brazil have shown that after pregnant women received the COVID-19 vaccine, antibodies against the new crown virus were detected in umbilical cord blood and newborn blood samples, and specific IgA antibodies also appeared in breast milk after lactating women were vaccinated.

In January, a study published in Obstetrics and Gynecology showed that American researchers injected lactating women with the new crown vaccine, but detected new crown antibodies in the baby, proving that breast milk can transmit the new crown antibody to the baby and let them get the new crown immunity.

What about antibody retention?

So how long can the resistance passed from mother to baby last?

New research shows that if a mother gains protection from a vaccine, the protection passed on to her baby lasts longer than that passed on to her baby by mothers infected with the new crown virus.

Researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital and the Ragon Institute included 77 pregnant women who received the vaccine and 12 patients with COVID-19 infection during pregnancy. At 6 months, the researchers looked at 28 babies born to vaccinated mothers and found that 57 percent (16) still contained detectable antibodies. In contrast, only 1 in 12 children born to mothers infected with the virus still had the antibody, or 8 percent. It can be seen that most of the babies of vaccinated mothers have sustained resistance at 6 months, while many infected babies have been undetectable.

How secure is it?

Unlike eating walnuts and grapes, expectant mothers have concerns about getting the COVID-19 vaccine: Is it safe?

At present, the mainland's recommendation for women who are trying to conceive, pregnant women and nursing mothers is to postpone the vaccination of the new crown virus.

Relevant experts explained in the previous popular science questions and answers that this is not because inactivated vaccines are harmful to these people and babies, but because there is currently no large enough sample size in the clinic to confirm the safety of such people after vaccination, and for scientific and rigorous considerations, vaccination is suspended.

With the large-scale vaccination, the safety verification of the new crown vaccine has gradually improved. For example, from April 2021 to August 2021, Brazilian pregnant women received more than 250,000 doses of the Klef COVID-19 vaccine (including advanced women over 40 years old), and the results showed that the new crown virus inactivated vaccine Corrafour showed a good safety profile in the maternal population.

"Other countries are generally vaccinating these women due to the severity of the COVID-19 pandemic." The expert, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that in some countries, pregnant women are included in the priority population for vaccination due to the high maternal mortality rate caused by the new crown pneumonia.

On the issue of safety evidence for expectant mothers to receive the new crown vaccine, the expert reminded that they should avoid falling into a circular "dilemma": because they dare not vaccinate pregnant women, there is no data on pregnant women's vaccination, and there is no scientific basis, let alone dare to give pregnant women ... He believes that the current global epidemic is still at a high level, and scientific demonstration should be deployed in advance to prepare this group for new crown immunity through vaccines.

Experts from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention have also pointed out that using new scientific evidence to adjust vaccines, vaccination procedures, vaccine policies and vaccination schedule arrangements, consolidate herd immunity brought by vaccines, and maintain protective immunity are the keys to China's exit from the pandemic.

Transferred from/Science and Technology Daily (Reporter Zhang Jiaxing)

Source: China Women's Daily