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Opinion: Infectious Diseases And Its Effects On The

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See the Major Article by Li et al on pages — Outbreaks of new and emerging viral diseases have always caused anxiety among persons and societies at risk for infection. In particular, this has been especially true for pregnant women, who fear not only for themselves but often even more so for their unborn infants.

Pregnant women, their fetuses, and infants are generally the most vulnerable members of society during an Dideases disease outbreak. These changes, which consist of Itd adaptive immune state including local suppression of cell-mediated immunity, and modifications in the maternal cardiovascular and respiratory systems, including increased oxygen consumption, heart rate, stroke volume, decreased lung capacity, and other physiological changes, may increase the likelihood for severe maternal illness from an infectious disease, and especially with those that have respiratory transmission [ https://amazonia.fiocruz.br/scdp/blog/culture-and-selfaeesteem/a-twist-in-childhood.php2 ]. Recent history is replete with examples of new and reemergent viral diseases that have adversely affected pregnant women, often causing greater harm Infectious Diseases And Its Effects On The them as a result of their condition than among infected but nonpregnant women.

Infectious diseases such as influenza, Ebola virus, hepatitis E, and varicella may have a more severe clinical course, increased complication rate, and higher case-fatality rate among pregnant women than in nonpregnant individuals.

The impact of emerging infections on the embryo or fetus is difficult to predict and varies depending on such factors as the agent, gestational timing of infection, and such host factors as the maternal—fetal interface. During the recent Ebola virus epidemics, nonvaccinated pregnant women were especially prone to excess morbidity and mortality, and the effects on their unborn infants were worse—only 2 newborns having the infection survived [ 3 ].

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In contrast, some pregnant women might be asymptomatic or have only mild or nonspecific symptoms from an infectious disease, resulting in their escaping detection as having infection even when the embryo or fetus is severely affected. During the Zika virus pandemic, infected pregnant women were typically asymptomatic, or at most had mild symptoms which were unconcerning. However, the virus stealthily crossed the placenta without even inducing an inflammatory response to produce a tragic spectrum of fetal malformations, neurological injuries, and even death [ 4 ]. An important aspect of the current coronavirus disease COVID pandemic is its effect on pregnant women and their infants.

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There have now been numerous publications addressing the adverse effects of COVID on pregnant women, as well as examining the infection status and clinical characteristics of their newborn infants [ 5—8 ]. However, there have been no data available to determine whether pregnancy itself has any consequences on the health of reproductive-aged women with COVID In order to investigate this important question, in this issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases Li et al [ 9 ] evaluated for the first time the effects of being pregnant on COVID disease and pneumonia using a case-control experimental design conducted at the Maternal and Child Health Hospital of Hubei Province, a bed tertiary medical center in Wuhan, China.

These 34 pregnant women with confirmed or suspected COVID pneumonia were compared with 2 cohorts of control cases.]