USA: children with brain damage were born to women who recovered from coronavirus

Two young women in the United States who recovered from COVID-19 had children born with brain damage. One child died.

These are the first such cases to support the hypothesis that the coronavirus affects the brain of infants by entering the placenta of mothers. informs New York Post. The results of a study by scientists at the University of Miami are published in the journal Pediatrics.

Several viruses are known to be able to cross the placenta and cause brain damage to the fetus, including cytomegalovirus, rubella, HIV, and Zika virus. The SARS-CoV-2 virus has been found in adult brain tissue, and some experts suspected it could also damage fetal brain tissue.

“This is the first time we have been able to demonstrate the virus in a fetus with a transplacental passage,” informed at the briefing, Dr. Michael Paidas, Chair of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Miami. “That’s why we think it’s so important.”

The authors of the study found that both babies were born to mothers who tested positive for coronavirus in the second trimester of pregnancy, at the peak of the spread of the delta variant in 2021 – vaccines were not yet available then. One woman survived the illness with mild symptoms and delivered at term. The second became seriously ill, the doctors had to take delivery at the 32nd week.

Immediately after birth, both babies had seizures. Their development was delayed. One of them died when he was 13 months old. The second child is in hospice.

Merlin Benny, a neonatologist and assistant professor of pediatrics at the university, says the children did not test positive for coronavirus. However, their blood tests showed high levels of antibodies to COVID-19. She notes that this is evidence that the virus is likely to be transmitted from the mother to the placenta, and then to the child. The researchers found signs of coronavirus in the placentas of both mothers. The autopsy of the deceased baby showed traces of the coronavirus in his brain, suggesting that the pathology was caused by direct infection. Doctors assumed that such cases were possible, but this study was the first direct evidence of the presence of the virus in the mother’s placenta or baby’s brain.

Although such cases are still considered rare, an obstetrician-gynecologist from Shahnaz Duara University said that women who contract coronavirus during pregnancy should contact their pediatrician in order to timely identify developmental delays in the child, which can appear over the years.

Source link