Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2022 Jul 13:13:923546.
doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2022.923546. eCollection 2022.

Coronavirus and Pregnancy: The Challenges of the 21st Century: A Review

Sumaiya Adam  1   2 , Carmen Pheiffer  1   3   4 , Stephanie Dias  3 , Tsakane Hlongwane  1   2 , Valerie Vannevel  2 , Priya Soma-Pillay  1   2 , Fareed Abdullah  5   6
Affiliations
Review

Coronavirus and Pregnancy: The Challenges of the 21st Century: A Review

Sumaiya Adam et al. Front Microbiol. .

Abstract

Despite many advances in medicine we are still faced with emerging pathogens. Pregnant women have been disproportionately affected by previous coronavirus outbreaks. The COVID-19 pandemic has not affected pregnant women as greatly as SARS-CoV and MERS, but has posed other challenges such as the need for quarantine and isolation, limited access to antenatal care, use of personal protective equipment (PPE), vaccine hesitancy and inequities in vaccine access and therapeutics between rich countries and the global south. This review will describe the impact of the significant coronaviruses on pregnancy, with special focus on the challenges being encountered by the SARS-CoV-2 global pandemic.

Keywords: MERS; SARS-CoV-2; coronavirus; health systems; pregnancy.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

References

    1. Abdelrahman Z., Li M., Wang X. (2020). Comparative review of SARS-CoV-2, SARS-CoV, MERS-CoV, and influenza a respiratory viruses. Front. Immunol. 11:5529. 10.3389/fimmu.2020.552909 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Abdullah F., Myers J., Basu D., Tintinger G., Ueckermann V., Mathebula M., et al. (2022). Decreased severity of disease during the first global omicron variant covid-19 outbreak in a large hospital in tshwane, south africa. Int. J. Infect. Dis. 116 38–42. 10.1016/j.ijid.2021.12.357 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Adam S., Maswime S., Soma-Pillay P., Matjila M., Chauke L., Botha M. H., et al. (2020). Judicious use of personal protective equipment to prevent the spread of covid-19 in maternity units. Afr. J. Obstet. Gynaecol. 26 2–3. 10.7196/SAJOG.2020.v26i1.1605 - DOI
    1. Ahmed T., Rahman A. E., Amole T. G., Galadanci H., Matjila M., Soma-Pillay P., et al. (2021). The effect of covid-19 on maternal newborn and child health (MNCH) services in bangladesh, nigeria and south africa: call for a contextualized pandemic in LMICs. Int. J. Equity Health 448:77. 10.1186/s12939-021-01414-5 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Alserehi H., Wali G., Alshukairi A. (2016). Impact of middle east respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) on pregnancy and perinatal outcome. BMC Infect Dis. 16:105.1. - PMC - PubMed