(Christine Birak/ CBC News) — Those who are pregnant or breastfeeding will have to weigh their own risks when deciding whether to be vaccinated to protect against COVID-19 because it hasn’t been studied in clinical trials, Canadian doctors say.
Without data on the safety of the vaccines during pregnancy and breastfeeding, there’s a grey area for people looking for answers to how the risk of COVID-19 compares with that of the immunizations.
It’s an especially pressing decision right now for health-care workers who are among the priority groups to be immunized given the risks of exposure to the virus they face on the job.
Dr. Sarah Lai, a pediatric surgeon and Canadian in Denver, Colo., is wrestling with the choice. She is seven months pregnant, wants to be vaccinated and is looking for more information.
“If I were to get it while I’m pregnant, is it going to induce labour earlier?” she asked. “I don’t know if it’s safe for me to have this vaccine.”
Dr. Noni MacDonald, a professor of pediatrics at Dalhousie University in Halifax, said there were some women who received coronavirus vaccines during the clinical trials who got pregnant immediately afterwards and haven’t yet delivered. (…)