A Florida mother recently gave birth to the first baby born with COVID-19 antibodies after specifically getting the antibodies from the COVID-19 vaccine, according to a new report from two doctors in Florida.
What happened?
The Florida mother — who is a health care worker — received the COVID-19 vaccine while she was pregnant, according to The Hill. She received the first dose of Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine in January. She gave birth three weeks later. The Moderna COVID-19 vaccine requires a second shot four weeks after the first shot.
- “We report the first known case of an infant with SARS-CoV-2 IgG antibodies detectable in cord blood after maternal vaccination,” the researchers concluded in the report.
Per The Hill, the researchers found COVID-19 antibodies in the baby girl’s blood samples after she was born.
Dr. Chad Rudnick, who was involved in the research, told WPBF that this is only one case of what could be millions to come. More research is needed to determine what this means for pregnant women at large.
- “This is one small case in what will be thousands and thousands of babies born to mothers who have been vaccinated (over) the next several months,” Rudnick said.
Flashback:
In December 2020, there was a baby born with COVID-19 antibodies after the baby’s mother was infected with COVID-19, as I wrote for the Deseret News.
Similarly, couple Natasha and Pele Ling gave birth to a baby who had COVID-19 antibodies after Natasha got COVID-19 during the pregnancy, Newser reports.
Reuters reports that doctors in China said there are antibodies in newborns from infected mothers.
Bigger picture
A study from Israel found that pregnant women who are vaccinated against COVID-19 can pass antibodies to their babies. The researchers gave 20 women both doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine during the third trimester and found antibodies in all the women and all the babies.