Influenza vaccine helps pregnant women

Inactivated influenza vaccine helps pregnant women and their babies from the serious consequences of influenza infection. Researchers from America assessed the clinical effectiveness of inactivated influenza vaccine administered during pregnancy. They studied 340 women, in their third trimester of pregnancy, who were randomly either given inactivated influenza vaccine or 23-valent pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccine. The women were interviewed weekly to assess illnesses until 24 weeks after birth of the baby. Subjects with respiratory illness accompanied by fever were assessed clinically, and ill infants were tested for influenza antigens. The researchers estimated the incidence of illness, incidence rate ratios, and vaccine effectiveness.Six cases of influenza before 24 weeks of age among the infants of influenza vaccinated mothers were found and 16 cases of infants who were given pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccine were reported. The vaccine was found to be 63 percent effective. Respiratory illness with fever occurred in 110 infants in the influenza vaccine group and 153 infants in the other group, with a vaccine effectiveness of 29 percent. Among the mothers, there was also a reduction in the rate of respiratory illness with fever of 36 percent.It was concluded that inactivated influenza vaccine reduced the rate of influenza illness by nearly two thirds in infants up to 6 months of age and averted roughly one third of all respiratory illness with fever in mothers and young infants.

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