Jakarta – Since the Covid-19 pandemic began, more than 125,000 infections with at least 161 deaths have occurred in pregnant women due to Covid-19 in the United States (US). This is according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
While feeding her baby girl, Amanda Harrison sometimes gets emotional and has to wipe the water eye with gratitude. She was lucky to be where she is now and able to hold her baby.
Harrison was 29 weeks pregnant and had not been vaccinated when he fell ill with Covid-19 in August 2021. His symptoms were mild at first, but suddenly he felt like he couldn’t breathe. Living in Phenix City, Alabama, USA, he was intubated and flown to House sick in Birmingham, where doctors helped deliver baby Lake, two months early and treated Harrison with a respirator machine to survive.
Kyndal Nipper, who is from outside Columbus, Georgia, USA, had only a brief bout of the coronavirus but the results were more tragic. Weeks before giving birth last July, Kyndal lost the baby boy she and her husband had planned to name Jack.
A pregnant woman wearing a mask and gloves holds her stomach as she queues to buy groceries at St. Church. Mary in Waltham, Massachusetts, USA, May 7, 2020 (Photo: voaindonesia.com/AP)
Now Harrison and Nipper are working with doctors to urge pregnant women to get the Covid-19 vaccine to protect themselves and their babies. Their advocacy comes amid a sharp increase in the number of seriously ill pregnant women. A total of 22 pregnant women died from Covid-19 in August 2021, a record in one month.
“We are committed to doing everything in our power to educate and advocate for our son, because no other family has had to go through something like this,” Nipper said.
Since the pandemic began, health officials have reported more than 125,000 infections in pregnant women with at least 161 deaths from Covid-19 in the US, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Over the past few months, hospitals and doctors in the coronavirus red zones have reported a sharp increase in the number of pregnant women who have become seriously ill.
With only 31% of pregnant women vaccinated nationwide, the CDC issued an urgent warning last September 29 recommending that they get a shot of the coronavirus vaccine. The agency warned that Covid-19 in pregnancy could lead to premature birth and other adverse effects. In addition, stillbirths have also been reported.
Dr Akila Subramaniam, assistant professor in the division of maternal and fetal medicine at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, said the hospital observed a significant increase in the number of critically ill pregnant women during July and August 2021. He said a local study found the delta variant of Covid-19 was associated with increasing rates of severe disease in pregnant women and increasing rates of preterm birth.
“Is it just because the delta variant is more contagious or is it more virulent? I don’t think we know for sure the answer,” he said.
When a Covid-19 vaccine became available to pregnant women in their states in the spring of this year, both Harrison, age 36 and Nipper, aged 29, decided to wait. Vaccine injections have not yet received final approval from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and pregnant women were not included in studies leading to emergency authorization. So, the initial guidelines did not fully recommend vaccination for them. Pfizer’s vaccine received official approval in August 2021.
The two women live in Alabama and Georgia, respectively, areas that have suffered from the delta variant this summer.
A pregnant woman receives the Sinovac vaccine in Indonesia, August 19, 2021, during an accelerated vaccination program (Photo: voaindonesia.com – AFP/June Kriswanto)
Harrison had severe symptoms, while Nipper had milder. When she was eight months pregnant, Nipper lost her sense of smell and developed a fever, a symptom that turns out to be a Covid-19 infection even though it looks small. The symptoms quickly disappeared, but the unborn Jack didn’t seem to be moving as much as before. He tried drinking caffeinated drinks and nothing changed. She was headed to a hospital in Columbus, Georgia for fetal monitoring when medical staff broke the news: baby Jack was dead.
“Baby Jack is supposed to see the world in less than three weeks. When told that the baby’s movement and heartbeat were absent because he was dead, it was news I didn’t expect to hear when I came to the hospital,” Nipper said.
Nipper’s doctor, Dr Timothy Villegas, said tests showed the placenta had shown a pattern of inflammation similar to the lungs of those who died from Covid-19. According to Dr. Villegas, special tests at Massachusetts General Hospital showed the placenta itself was infected with the virus.
Villegas expressed his suspicion that the placental damage from Covid-19 “impacts on the ability of the fetus to receive oxygen, nutrients, etc. This situation then causes infant death.”
The doctor said it was the first time one of his patients had experienced a newborn death due to a virus, but he had learned about it from other regional doctors.
“We are at a point where everyone is starting to give warnings (of the dangers of COVID-19 to the fetus),” he said.
In western Alabama, Dr. Cheree Melton, an obstetrician and lecturer at the University of Alabama, said she and her colleagues had some patients who were not vaccinated and infected with Covid-19 had miscarriages, or babies died in childbirth, a problem exacerbated by the spread of the delta variant.
“It’s heartbreaking to tell a mother she will never be able to hold her baby. We have had to do that so many times more than I can remember happening in recent years.”
Melton encourages every pregnant woman he cares for but has not been vaccinated to get a shot. However, many are still not ready. Some of them said they had not thought about vaccination. But rumors and misinformation are also a big problem.
A pregnant woman shows her vaccination card after receiving a dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine against Covid-19 at a vaccination center in Bogota, South America, July 23, 2021 (Photo: voaindonesia.com/AFP)
Nipper and Harrison share their story in the hope of getting other women to consult a doctor about vaccinations.
“If only I asked more questions about it. Looking back, I tried to do everything possible to give him a healthy life. The only thing I didn’t do and I will live with, is that I didn’t get vaccinated.” he said.
When he came home from the hospital with a healthy baby, Harrison expressed his deep gratitude – as well as guilt over what the baby had gone through because he was not vaccinated.
“I always cry over trivial things. Feeding or hugging my 4 year old thinking about what if they had to live life without me and that’s a reality for many people nowadays. It’s very scary and everything could have been prevented if I was vaccinated .” (mg/lt)/voaindonesia.com. []
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