Pregnant women who carry covid-19 usually do not appear to transmit the disease to their babies. It shows two new Chinese studies.

In the past month, China has published two studies showing that newborn babies are not normally infected by mothers affected by the coronavirus. The studies are based on a total of thirteen pregnant women who have contracted covid-19, nine and four respectively in the first and second studies. The women gave birth to their babies at a hospital in Wuhan. None of the thirteen babies were affected by the severe symptoms of the disease, such as fever and cough.

The delivery was performed by cesarean section

All but one birth were performed by cesarean section. The doctors considered that the method was the safest for reducing the risk of infection, although the baby who was born vaginally was fully healthy. The babies were put directly into incubators and fed with milk replacer.

One of the babies in the latter study was treated for three days for a minor complication with breathing. The same baby, along with another, suffered a rash that later disappeared. Now all babies and their mothers are reported to be fully healthy. According to the doctors at Wuhan Hospital, it is impossible to make any connections if the complications were due to covid-19.

Newborn babies are not infected by the Coronavirus

It is unclear if pregnant women are more vulnerable

Respiratory tract infections caused by other types of coronavirus, sars, and mers, affect pregnant women more severely than non-pregnant women. It is yet to be determined whether the same applies to the Covid-19 viral disease. As yet, there is no evidence to support this. Whether the coronavirus affects pregnant women in other ways is still unclear, but Jan Albert, a chief physician of the Karolinska Institute, believes the risk of it is limited.

– It requires a longer follow-up time to know for sure, but my impression is that pregnant women are not hit harder by the virus.

Case with infected baby and larger children’s study

At the end of last week, there was also information about a coronas infected baby in the UK.

New research: Children do not get severe symptoms of the coronavirus

New research shows that children get milder symptoms than adults when they contract the new pandemic covid-19.

Ten children from China who were diagnosed with the new coronavirus showed both fewer and milder symptoms compared to adults, according to a study published today in the journal Nature Medicine.

Other symptoms than adults

Of the children included in the study, no fever was over 39 degrees when they were admitted to the hospital. In contrast, two of the children had a higher fever during the treatment period, and all children were treated with antiviral drugs.

The children also showed fewer symptoms than many adults do. The children mainly had cough, sore throat, and nasal congestion, unlike adults who can also get muscle and headaches, drowsiness and, in the worst case, breathing difficulties. Thus, none of these more severe symptoms affected the children.

No signs of pneumonia

In addition, none of the children showed signs of pneumonia on the X-ray examinations, which could otherwise be a serious sequela of Covid-19.

“It is really difficult to assess such figures, but obviously it seems to be a mild illness in children,” says Lars Ollison, an associate professor at the University of Gothenburg.

Correction: An earlier version of the article stated that no child had more than 39 degrees of fever, but this was on arrival at the hospital. Later, two children developed fever above 39 degrees.