MIAMI – Dr. Merline Benny, a pediatrician at the University of Miami’s Miller School of Medicine, said COVID-19 has had a profound effect on global health and more so on pregnant women.
A new study recently published in The Journal of Pediatrics shows COVID-19 can cross into the placenta of pregnant women and cause brain injury in newborns.
The list of cases includes two newborns at the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Holtz Children’s Hospital at the University of Miami/Jackson Memorial Medical Center.
“We found evidence that the virus indeed crossed the placenta and infected the brain,” Dr. Ali Saad said.
Both babies were born fairly early into the pandemic, during the Delta wave, before COVID-19 vaccines were available, and both mothers contracted COVID during their second trimester.
The babies exhibited symptoms like seizures. Their brains stopped growing shortly after birth. One baby died at 13 months, while the COVID-19 virus was still in the baby’s brain.
The clinicians in Miami reported hundreds of babies have been born to mothers who tested positive to COVID-19, so the two cases are rare.
“The message here is that most women who contract COVID have healthy babies but there is a sub-pop of people who have babies who are sick, not to panic,” said Dr. Shahnaz Duara, the NICU medical director. “But we do think that these are the extremes and we do think if you’ve had COVID during pregnancy, you should tell your pediatrician and maybe those babies need a little closer follow-up.”
Dr. Michael Paidas said researchers are continuing their work in the laboratory in an effort to understand the COVID-19 pathology, and also develop therapeutics for it.