COVID-19: Pregnant Women Can’t Get Vaccinated – Pfizer

Onyema Ogbuagu, a Nigerian-American medical doctor leading Pfizer research on COVID-19 vaccine said pregnant women are not included in the clinical trials of the Pfizer and BioNTech vaccine.

Eko Hot Blog reports that Ogbuagu spoke on Saturday, at a virtual series on the theme, ‘COVID-19: Vaccine, Hesitancy, Myths and Reality’, organised by the Nigeria in Diaspora Commission (NiDCOM) in partnership with Ngex.

Ogbuaju said the vaccine, however, does not cause infertility.

“We did not include pregnant women. We did not include breastfeeding women. We did not include them in this study. We conducted them on non-pregnant women and we were assured of safety,” Ogbuagu said

In his response to a question on side effects, Ogbuagbu said there are no expected long-term adverse consequences, as the properties of the vaccine disintegrate in the body within a day.

“There are at least 75,000 or 76,000 people who have already received COVID mRNA vaccine. The vaccine disintegrates in the body in hours, majorly after you get the vaccine. We do not anticipate any long-term side effect that has not been detected very early on. We are pretty confident about the safety record of the vaccine,” he added..

Asked why airlines insist on passengers being vaccinated before they can board, the medical expert said it was in order.

“It does make sense that being vaccinated against COVID should be a requirement. Is there a model for this? Absolutely. How many of you have yellow cards? Don’t many of us have yellow cards for yellow fever vaccination? Those are important. So, sometimes we get to think of COVID-19 differently and forget how we have managed other deadly infectious diseases. I think airlines requiring people to have vaccines, I would support them,” the doctor said.

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Speaking on why attention and research are focused on COVID-19 and not malaria, Ogbuagbu said COVID-19 has had wider negative impact on humans and the economy within a short period.

He implored African leaders to address the health challenges affecting the continent.

A starting point, he said should include, developing and supporting scientists, building research infrastructure and creating enabling environments.