Pfizer RSV Vaccine for Pregnant Women Now Available for Free: What You Need to Know

The vaccine against Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV) is now available for pregnant people. The application will be free for people who are between 32 and 36 weeks of pregnancy. The objective of vaccination is to allow the transmission of antibodies during pregnancy and offers protection to babies during the first six months of life.

RSV is one of the main causes of lower respiratory tract infections during the first months of life, such as bronchiolitis or viral pneumonia. Although bronchiolitis is the most common severe manifestation, infections with this virus are also associated with an increased long-term risk of recurrent wheezing (bronchospasms) and development of asthma. This virus accounts for a third of deaths in the first year of life and most occur in low- or middle-income countries.

The vaccine against this virus is now available in vaccination centers throughout the country. The national Ministry of Health included this vaccine within the National Immunization Calendar. For this reason, the application will be free and mandatory.

In September 2023, the National Administration of Medicines, Food and Medical Technology (Anmat) approved this vaccine, almost at the same time that the medical authorities of Europe and the United States did the same. The approval was given after a study carried out by professionals from different parts of the world.

The medicine was developed by the Pfizer laboratory. During phase 3 of the research, doctors conducted a test with 7,000 pregnant people. Their results were controlled by monitoring the inoculated person and then the baby and were published in April 2023 in the international medical journal The New England Journal of Medicine.

240 centers from countries such as the United States, Canada, Finland, Japan, the Netherlands, South Africa and Argentina participated in the research. “In our country, the study took place in different centers in Buenos Aires, Córdoba, Salta and Tucumán, which provided more than 12% of the data, positioning the country as one of the global leaders,” indicates the report where announces the availability of the vaccine.

About the research, Doctor Gonzalo Pérez Marc, who was one of the main researchers of the clinical trial of the vaccine in Argentina, commented that the results obtained “showed a broad benefit from immunization. Having a tool to protect the little ones from birth, through the transmission of antibodies from the vaccinated pregnant person, and having it included in the National Immunization Calendar, represents an excellent tool against a virus that is extremely aggressive in the little ones. and opens a wide spectrum for future studies using this methodology”

The new calendar includes. (Government of Córdoba)

For his part, the Chief Emeritus and Consultant of the Children’s Infectious Diseases Service of the Austral University Hospital, Enrique Casanueva, said: “The vaccine will help us reduce the impact of RSV in the community and on public health, especially at the time of Autumn Winter. Because in addition to the compromise in the health of the infant, outbreaks of bronchiolitis usually saturate the availability of beds in health centers, surgeries must be canceled or scheduled consultations suspended, and families experience absenteeism from work (even those whose children are not hospitalized) with its corresponding cost, among other complications”

“The main message for families is that we now have a free, effective and safe vaccine included in the National Immunization Calendar, which will offer protection to children in the first months of life, which is the period where registers the highest rate of severe RSV infections,” Casanueva remarked.

And he concluded: “It is an excellent opportunity for all pregnant women to receive the vaccine between 32 and 36 weeks of gestation and it is the responsibility of their treating doctors to indicate it during that period of pregnancy. It is also important to note that this vaccine can be administered together with any of the other vaccines indicated during pregnancy (acellular triple bacterial, influenza and COVID-19).”

2024-02-29 23:17:19
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