In a first, woman delivers baby with antibodies against coronavirus

A US woman, who was administered the first dose of the coronavirus vaccine while pregnant recently, recently gave birth to a baby with antibodies against COVID-19. Pediatricians have claimed it to be the first such known case.

They presented the conclusion in a preprint article, which means the claim is yet to be peer-reviewed. The study, posted in medRxiv, stated that the woman was administered a single dose of the Moderna mRNA vaccine at 36 weeks and three days of her gestation period.

She delivered a healthy, strong, and full-term girl three weeks later. The blood sample of the baby girl, taken immediately following her birth, showed the presence of antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 virus, the study noted.

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"Here, we report the first known case of an infant with SARS-CoV-2 IgG antibodies detectable in cord blood after maternal vaccination," noted co-authors Paul Gilbert and Chad Rudnick from Florida Atlantic University in the US.

The woman, who had been breastfeeding the baby exclusively, received the second dose of the vaccine as per the normal 28-day vaccination protocol timeline, the doctors noted.

While earlier studies showed that the passage of antibodies from COVID-recovered mothers to their foetuses via the placenta was lower than expected, current research suggests "potential for protection and infection risk reduction from SARS-CoV-2 with maternal vaccination."

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However, Gilbert and Rudnick note that further long-term studies are needed to quantify the antibody response in babies born to vaccinated mothers.

"Protective efficacy in newborns and ideal timing of maternal vaccination remains unknown," the pediatricians wrote in the study.

"We urge other investigators to create pregnancy and breastfeeding registries as well as conduct efficacy and safety studies of the COVID-19 vaccines in pregnant and breastfeeding women and their offspring," they added.

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