CDC released new data Aug. 11 regarding the safety of the COVID-19 vaccines in pregnant people and is recommending all people 12 and older get the COVID-19 vaccine.
"CDC encourages all pregnant people or people who are thinking about becoming pregnant and those breastfeeding to get vaccinated to protect themselves from COVID-19," Rochelle Walensky, MD, director of the CDC, said in an Aug. 11 news release. "The vaccines are safe and effective, and it has never been more urgent to increase vaccinations as we face the highly transmissible delta variant and see severe outcomes from COVID-19 among unvaccinated pregnant people."
The new CDC analysis of current data from its pregnancy registry examined vaccination early in pregnancy. Researchers did not find an increased risk of miscarriage among almost 2,500 pregnant people who received an mRNA COVID-19 vaccine before 20 weeks of pregnancy. For the general population, miscarriage typically occurs in about 11-16 percent of pregnancies, and this study found miscarriage rates after a COVID-19 vaccine to be around 13 percent.
Previous data from three safety monitoring systems didn't identify any safety concerns for pregnant people or their babies for those vaccinated late in pregnancy.