US CDC recommends pregnant women to take Covid-19 vaccine

The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has recommended pregnant women who are confused regarding coronavirus vaccination to get the shots.

According to The Washington Post (WaPo), at a White House briefing on the coronavirus Friday, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said that vaccination surveillance systems showed "no safety concerns" for more than 35,000 women in their third trimester or for their babies.

"Pregnant people experienced the same side effects as others following vaccination. We were also able to follow in detail more than 3,900 pregnant women. And over 800 of whom have completed their pregnancies. Importantly, no safety concerns were observed for people vaccinated in the third trimester or safety concerns for their babies," she said.

"We know that this is a deeply personal decision," she added, "and I encourage people to talk to their doctors and their primary care providers to determine what is best for them and for their baby."

She further explained that because the initial vaccine trials did not include pregnant women, there had been limited data on possible problems. As a result, different health authorities and professional medical groups had offered cautious, or even conflicting, guidance.

WaPo reported that the CDC had previously suggested that pregnant women make their decisions in consultation with their doctors. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists said coronavirus vaccines "should not be withheld from pregnant individuals" but stopped short of explicitly recommending the shots for that population.

In contrast, the World Health Organisation (WHO) had said that only pregnant women at a high risk of contracting the virus or of having severe COVID-19 should be vaccinated.

However, peer-reviewed data from several national surveillance systems presented in early March and published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday supported an optimistic outlook, even as researchers urged further study.

According to the CDC, as many as 290,685,655 vaccine doses have been delivered while 225,640,460 COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered, as of April 24 (local time).

As many as 138,644,724 people across the US have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 jab while, 93,078,040 vaccines have been totally vaccinated across the country, the agency reported.

The US continues to be the worst affected country by the pandemic reporting over 31 million COVID-19 cases and over 570,000 deaths due to the deadly pathogen.