Below I am going to elaborate certain points on this vaccination dilemma
Covid vaccines are killed vaccines. We are already using certain killed vaccines like tdAp and tatanus toxoid in pregnancy. Thus theoretically covid vaccines also can be safely used in pregnancy and breastfeeding mothers.
Theoretically Covid vaccines should protect both mother and the baby from covid 19. And it will be of great benefit in this pandemic.
But while testing the safety of the vaccine children, pregnant and breast feeding mothers were excluded from the study. Thus at present we do not have any data whether this covid vaccine will or will not produce any serious side-effect in pregnancy and breastfeeding mothers and children.
Now as already millions of covid vaccine doses are already being administered worldwide, researchers are gaining confidence that the covid vaccines should work effectively in pregnant and breastfeeding mothers without any serious side-effects.
Several countries have started vaccinating pregnant and breastfeeding mothers only after one-to-one discussion between mother and doctor. Till now the accumulated data from those counties are encouraging.
In India a pregnant mother or a breast feeding mother can get the covid vaccine only after signing a consent that she understands that enough safety data is lacking. But the benefit of getting vaccinated in this pandemic situation weighs more than the risk.
