Pregnant women can get the COVID-19 vaccine without any fear of causing birth defects in their unborn child, a new study says.

Researchers found no link between COVID vaccination in early pregnancy and birth defects, results show.

There were also no differences in birth defect risk between either the Moderna and the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines, researchers reported in the journal Pediatrics.

“These results support the safety of COVID-19 vaccination in early pregnancy,” concluded the research team led by Stacey Rowe, a postdoctoral fellow in infectious diseases at the University of California-San Francisco.

The vaccine is recommended for pregnant women, because COVID infection during pregnancy has been linked to an increased risk of preterm birth, stillbirth and newborns requiring care in a neonatal intensive care unit, researchers said in background notes.

However, some resistance to the vaccine has been reported due to concerns that it might cause birth defects, researchers noted.

For the new study, researchers examined more than 78,000 pregnancies detailed in claims data from public and private health insurance providers.

In all, 1,248 birth defects were noted among unvaccinated people and 199 among vaccinated folks, results show.

Overall, there were no significant differences between birth defects in vaccinated and unvaccinated women.

There were a little more than 160 birth defects per 10,000 live births among the unvaccinated, compared with 156 per 10,000 for women who were vaccinated, results show.

The rate of birth defects didn’t change even if pregnant women received other recommended vaccines, such as the influenza or whooping cough shots, researchers said.

The same was true if a pregnant woman caught COVID during pregnancy, researchers said.

“The study’s findings are consistent with a growing body of literature supporting the safety of COVID-19 vaccines and their use in pregnancy, including in early periods of gestation,” researchers concluded.

“Vaccine safety is a common concern for patients considering vaccination,” they wrote. “Provider recommendations are the most important predictors of person’s decision to vaccinate during pregnancy, even for those who have previously declined.”

“Our findings can strengthen provider-to-patient discussions relating to the safety of COVID-19 vaccines during pregnancy,” the report continued. “Providers across all clinical and public health settings should recommend COVID-19 vaccination for their pregnant patients at any period of gestation.”

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about the COVID vaccine and women who are pregnant or breastfeeding.

SOURCE: Pediatrics, March 14, 2025

Source: HealthDay

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