THURSDAY, March 18 (HealthDay News) -- Pregnant women with the H1N1
(swine) flu were 13 times more likely to become critically ill than
non-pregnant women infected with H1N1, according to a report from
researchers in Australia
and New Zealand.
In the study, published online March 19 in BMJ,
the
investigators found that 11 percent of mothers and 12 percent of the
babies died, but the authors noted that it is difficult to draw
conclusions because there were few pregnant women infected with H1N1 to
study.
The researchers, led by Dr. Ian Seppelt from the
Australian and New
Zealand Intensive
Care Influenza Investigators, looked at the medical
records of pregnant women and women who had given birth within the
previous four weeks who had contracted H1N1 and were hospitalized in the
intensive care unit
(ICU) between June and August 2009.
Of 64 women included in the study, those who were
more than 20 weeks
pregnant faced a 13-fold higher risk of ending up in an ICU compared to
women with H1N1 flu who weren't pregnant.
None of the women had been immunized against seasonal
flu despite
recommendations that moms-to-be get vaccinated, the study authors
pointed
out.
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