Children’s Development May Be Affected By Covid During Pregnancy

For much of the pandemic, discussions of Covid-19 in pregnancy were dominated by a simple reassurance: Babies rarely tested positive. Doctors concluded that the virus seldom passed from mother to fetus.

That message shaped medical guidance and public perception of the risks, but it was incomplete. Early studies relied heavily on nasal swab PCR tests that focused on whether babies had an active infection at birth. But these didn’t reveal what harm might have occurred in the womb. And as the pandemic unfolded, particularly during the more virulent alpha and delta waves, cracks appeared in that early certainty. More pregnant patients became seriously ill. Stillbirth rates rose. Pathologists and pediatricians began reporting unusual placental damage and puzzling immune patterns in newborns.