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Getting vaccinated against COVID-19 during pregnancy may also help protect babies after they're born, according to new research published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Babies whose mothers received two shots of either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines during pregnancy had a 61% lower risk of being hospitalized with COVID in their first six months of life, the study found. "The bottom line is that maternal vaccination is a really important way to help protect these young infants," said Dr. Dana Meaney-Delman, chief of the CDC's Infant Outcome Monitoring, Research and Prevention branch. She notes that is particularly important because there's no vaccine authorized for babies under 6 months old. (Godoy, 2/15)

Scientists studied 379 infants under the age of six months at 20 different children's hospitals across 17 states from July 2021 to January 2022. Of the 176 babies who were hospitalized with COVID-19, 84% of them were born to mothers who did not get vaccinated during their pregnancy, the study determined. Researchers also found that 88% of babies admitted to intensive care units with COVID-19 were born to mothers who were not vaccinated. The one infant who died during the study was born to an unvaccinated mother. (Powell, 2/15)

Dr. Dana Meaney-Delman, head of the CDC’s infant outcomes branch, said the study suggests antibodies transferred from the mother to her developing fetus protect the newborn against Covid. “Unfortunately, vaccination of infants younger than 6 months old is not currently on the horizon, highlighting why vaccination during pregnancy is so important for these young infants,” Meaney-Delman told reporters during a conference call on Tuesday. (Kimball, 2/15)

Vaccination lowers the risk of developing long-term effects of covid-19, according to a report released Tuesday by a British public health agency. At least 50 percent of people who survive covid-19 experience a variety of physical and psychological health issues for six months or more after their initial recovery, according to research on the long-term effects of the disease. The adverse symptoms associated with “long covid” vary from person to person but generally include fatigue, shortness of breath and cognitive difficulty, among other maladies. (Cheng, 2/16)

People who have a vitamin D deficiency are more likely to have a severe or fatal case of COVID-19, researchers said. In a retrospective study published in the journal PLOS ONE, scientists from Galilee Medical Center and Bar Ilan University in Israel examined the records of more than 1,176 patients admitted between April 7, 2020, and Feb. 4, 2021, to the Nahariya-based Galilee Medical Center with positive PCR (polymerase chain reaction) tests for SAR-CoV-2. Those records were searched for vitamin D levels measured two weeks to two years prior to infection. (Musto, 2/15)

Older women's estrogen levels may be linked to their chances of dying from COVID-19, with higher levels of the hormone seemingly protective against severe infection, according to an observational study yesterday in BMJ Open. The study included 14,685 postmenopausal Swedish women from 50 to 80 years old who had COVID-19. Researchers divided them into three groups: (1) women with previously diagnosed breast cancer and receiving endocrine therapy (decreased estrogen levels), (2) women receiving hormone replacement therapy (increased estrogen), and (3) a control group of women not receiving either therapy. (2/15)

A South African study showed that the risk of hospitalization from the omicron BA.2 sub-variant is similar to that from the original strain, a senior scientist said. The study in the country, where the BA.2 strain is now dominant, may not extrapolate to other countries as most of the immunity South Africans have is from prior infections with Covid-19 rather than vaccinations, Cheryl Cohen, head of the Centre for Respiratory Diseases at the National Institute for Communicable Diseases, said on an online press conference. That could give better protection she said. The emergence of BA.2 caused concern as it appears to be more transmissible than BA.1, the strain first identified. (Sguazzin, 2/16)