The Zaragoza Clinic investigates the placentas of mothers who have had covid
26 April 2021
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The prestigious journal Jama Pediatrics has published the results, coordinated by the University of Oxford and obtained by more than a hundred researchers from 43 hospitals in 18 countries.
The INTERCOVID project confirms that infected women are 50% more likely to present complications during pregnancy
The prestigious magazine JAMA Pediatrics has published the results of the INTERCOVID study, coordinated by the University of Oxford, which concludes that COVID-19 increases the risk of complications during pregnancy for mothers and babies, a greater danger than had been observed at the beginning of the study. pandemic, so, according to the authors, pregnant women should be considered one of the priority groups when taking preventive measures such as vaccination. An international team of more than a hundred researchers from 43 hospitals in 18 low-, middle- and high-income countries participated in the project, with the collaboration of more than 2.100 pregnant women. On the part of Spain, the Lozano Blesa University Clinical Hospital in Zaragoza, whose researchers belong to the Aragon Health Research Institute (IIS Aragón) and the Vall d'Hebron University Hospital in Barcelona, have intervened.
Data from the INTERCOVID study provide detailed comparative information on the effects of SARS-CoV-2 on pregnancy for the first time, showing that women with COVID-19 are 50% more likely to experience complications during pregnancy, such as preterm birth , preeclampsia (high blood pressure during pregnancy), or admission to the ICU. Although the risk of death also appears to increase due to COVID-19, it should be noted that the number of pregnant women who have complications in developed countries is very low.
Newborns of infected women appear to have almost three times the risk of serious medical complications and having to be admitted to the neonatal ICU, mainly due to the increase in premature births. “Furthermore, although one in ten newborns born to mothers who tested positive for the virus also tested positive during the first postnatal days, it is important to note that breastfeeding does not appear to be related to this increase in infection,” highlights Daniel Orós, a specialist in obstetrics and gynecology at the Lozano Blesa University Clinical Hospital in Zaragoza and principal investigator of the Placenta research group of the Aragón Health Research Institute (IIS Aragón). However, cesarean delivery could be associated with an increased risk of having an infected newborn,” he adds.
For her part, Nerea Maíz, specialist in the Obstetrics Service of the Vall d'Hebron Hospital and researcher in the Maternal and Fetal Medicine group of the Vall d'Hebron Research Institute (VHIR), highlights that it has been possible to demonstrate that “the risks, For both the mother and the newborn, in asymptomatic infected pregnant women they are similar to those of non-infected pregnant women.”
The quality of information available until now on the effect of COVID-19 on pregnancy was very limited. The INTERCOVID study demonstrates the need to collect large-scale, multinational data quickly during a health crisis. The study compared each woman affected by COVID-19 with two uninfected pregnant women who gave birth at the same time in the same hospital. These results are an important step in ensuring the best possible care for mothers and their babies, and the next challenge, researchers say, is to examine the long-term effects on mothers and their babies.
About IIS Aragón
The IIS Aragón is the Health Research Institute formed by the “Lozano Blesa” and “Miguel Servet” Teaching and University Hospitals, Primary Health Care, the University of Zaragoza and the Aragonese Institute of Health Sciences. The objectives of the IIS Aragón are to bring together basic and applied, clinical and health services research; create a quality research, care and teaching environment to which health professionals, training specialists and postgraduate and undergraduate students are exposed, as well as constitute the ideal place for attracting talent and the location of large scientific facilities. technological.
