Exclusive: While risk of H5N1 pandemic in humans is low, ‘it’s really important to think about vulnerable populations’, Melbourne researcher says

Summary

A study reviewing 1,500 research papers found that 90% of pregnant women who contract bird flu (H5N1) die, with 87% of their unborn babies also dying.

Most surviving babies are born prematurely.

While human cases are rare and usually result from direct contact with infected birds, the findings highlight the vulnerability of pregnant women, who often face exclusion from vaccine trials and public health programs.

Experts stress the need for pandemic preparedness and ethical studies on vaccine safety in pregnant women as H5N1 continues to spread globally.

  • Natanael@slrpnk.netEnglish
    4·
    11 hours ago

    Do you count blood samples and vaccination as some kind of sinister “medical experiments”?

    • Revan343@lemmy.caEnglish
      1·
      7 hours ago

      Vaccine trials are in fact medical experiments. Not sure where you’re getting ‘sinister’ from

    • Hestkuk@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      1·
      9 hours ago

      Despite being a high-risk population, pregnant women are often excluded from vaccine trials, from priority access to therapeutics, and experience delayed entry into public health vaccination programs.”

      There are no specific vaccines for avian influenza in humans, though trial vaccines have been developed for pandemic preparedness in some countries. But these vaccines are not recommended for pregnant women because of a lack of safety data.

      “That’s one of the challenges we often have with vaccines, as it is considered unsafe to test them in pregnant women,” Purcell said. “I think as we move forward, what we need to do is think about how we get data on pregnant women.

      “If women are enrolled in vaccine safety studies, sometimes those women will inadvertently become pregnant, and there’s an opportunity to ethically study what happens to those women.”

      This is the point of the study, the point of the article, the interest being advocated here by Dr Rachael Purcell. Conducting vaccine trials on pregnant women.

      There are very good reasons why this is not done. Firstly, the fetus could be harmed or killed. Secondly, the data from pregnant women is useless for assessing safety and efficacy in anyone other than a pregnant woman. As the vast majority of the population are not pregnant women, it is unnecessarily hazardous and a waste of limited resources to test a vaccine on pregnant women first. That can come later, once you’ve developed a useful vaccine and deployed it widely, reducing the risk of infection of everyone in a society, including pregnant women.

      • Natanael@slrpnk.netEnglish
        3·
        5 hours ago

        Vaccines are very well understood, the reason for those exceptions is the very high complexity and sensitivity of pregnancies, there’s no significant indicators of danger but they aren’t willing to risk missing some unknown.

        women are enrolled in vaccine safety studies, sometimes those women will inadvertently become pregnant, and there’s an opportunity to ethically study what happens to those women.”

        This is the point of the study, the point of the article, the interest being advocated here by Dr Rachael Purcell. Conducting vaccine trials on pregnant women.

        This is essentially the exact opposite of what you’re saying. This is just collecting data on a group of women who only incidentally end up fitting the criteria. Nobody’s selecting pregnant women to expose them to anything.

      • lad@programming.devEnglish
        1·
        5 hours ago

        As the vast majority of the population are not pregnant women

        …there is no reason to try to change whatever bad is expected to happen to them. I can understand your point, but it doesn’t sound humane to me