by Claudia Boyd-Barrett posted in Pregnancy

News of a study linking one version of the flu vaccine to early miscarriage hit the headlines this week. But does that mean you should skip the flu vaccine if you?re pregnant"
Absolutely not, according to the study authors, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. These experts continue to recommend that pregnant women get the flu vaccine to protect themselves and their unborn babies from the dangers of influenza (which, by the way, is itself a risk for miscarriage).
The study, published in the journal Vaccine, compared medical records on 485 women who had miscarriages with 485 pregnant women who did not. They found that women who?d received the H1N1 version of the flu vaccine during their first trimester 2 years in a row were more likely to miscarry than women who did not fit that criteria. These women had received the vaccine within the 28 days before they miscarried, the study said.
Here are some reasons not to panic:
? This is just 1 study. Many other studies have shown flu vaccines are safe during pregnancy, although there is much less research on vaccines during the first trimester.
? Only 17 women in the study had miscarriages possibly linked to the flu vaccine. That?s a very small number, not enough to provide conclusive evidence.
? The study doesn?t prove that H1N1 vaccines cause miscarriages, it just shows a possible association between the two. Th...