Pregnant women can now get COVID-19 jab in Indonesia: Health Ministry

Photo: Pixabay.
Photo: Pixabay.

Expectant mothers in Indonesia can now get the COVID-19 vaccine after the Health Ministry updated its eligibility list to include the high-risk group.

The ministry yesterday issued a circular ordering regional health departments to administer the COVID-19 vaccine to pregnant women, particularly in areas with high levels of transmission of the coronavirus, as they have been deemed to be particularly at risk to develop severe symptoms if infected. 

“The vaccines that may be administered to pregnant women are the mRNA-based vaccines by Pfizer and Moderna and the inactivated vaccine by Sinovac,” a passage in the circular reads.

The AstraZeneca vaccine, the other vaccine currently distributed in Indonesia’ mass inoculation program, has not been recommended for pregnant women. 

The ministry did not cite a reason for the omission, but the AstraZeneca vaccine has been associated with a rare risk of blood clotting in Indonesia and abroad. In the UK, where the vaccine was developed, it is not recommended for pregnant women due to the blood clotting risk. 

Pregnant women can get their first shot in their second trimester at the earliest, with the second shot administered in line with the recommended interval of the type of vaccine.

Indonesia was relatively late in including pregnant women in the COVID-19 vaccine eligibility list, despite recommendations from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Indonesian Society of Obstetrics and Gynecology (POGI).

According to POGI, at least 536 pregnant women tested positive for COVID-19 over the past year and that 3 percent of them had died. Half of the pregnant women who died were asymptomatic.

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