{"id":1696,"date":"2021-11-18T09:14:09","date_gmt":"2021-11-18T14:14:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/?p=1696"},"modified":"2021-11-19T11:46:13","modified_gmt":"2021-11-19T16:46:13","slug":"do-covid-19-vaccines-impact-fertility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/?p=1696","title":{"rendered":"Do COVID-19 vaccines impact fertility?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Question:<\/span><\/strong> Since you have become my default COVID guru, did you have something on COVID-19 vaccines and fertility, particularly how it might affect your chances if you are planning to get pregnant. This keeps coming up as a reason for requesting an accommodation.  How valid is this reason?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Answer:\u00a0<\/span><\/strong>Fear that the COVID vaccine might negatively affect fertility is pervasive.*\u00a0 It’s also baseless, and an invalid reason for accommodation. First, there is\u00a0no credible, biologically plausible mechanism<\/a>\u00a0for inactivated vaccines (like J&J, Pfizer, and Moderna) to interfere with pregnancy or fertility.\u00a0 As\u00a0CDC explains<\/a>, “no evidence shows that any vaccines, including COVID-19 vaccines, cause fertility problems (problems trying to get pregnant) in women or men.”\u00a0 But as\u00a0many of us have said before, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.\u00a0 And here’s a really important update: evidence continues to accumulate showing that COVID vaccines do not impact fertility (see the synthesis of a few recent studies herein).\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, evidence also continues to accumulate showing that getting COVID-19 is the real danger to pregnancy outcomes and fertility.  As ScienceNews summarized in a report published last week<\/a>, “pregnant women who get COVID-19 are more likely to deliver their babies prematurely<\/a> and may be admitted to the intensive care unit or die at a higher rate than uninfected women, a study of studies published last year in the British Medical Journal<\/em> found. And men who get COVID-19 may have lower levels of testosterone<\/a> and low sperm counts<\/a> after infection, and may be more likely to have erectile dysfunction<\/a>, three studies show. It\u2019s not clear whether any of those problems continue long-term.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Synthesis of several recent studies:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. SARS-CoV-2 spike protein seropositivity from vaccination or infection does not cause sterility<\/a>: This study of in vitro fertilization found no difference in implantation or pregnancy rates based on women’s documented seropositivity (to the spike protein) status.\u00a0 It’s findings are similar to results from\u00a0two other studies<\/a>\u00a0recently reported at the October 2021\u00a0American Society of Reproductive Medicine Scientific Congress & Expo.\u00a0 This evidence adds to accumulating knowledge debunking concerns that were widely spread on the internet from a former Pfizer scientist (for more, read the discussion section of this paper).\u00a0\u00a0<\/li>
  2. Sperm Parameters Before and After COVID-19 mRNA Vaccination<\/a>: This study assessed\u00a0\u00a0semen volume, sperm concentration, sperm motility, and total motile sperm count in healthy volunteers before and after COVID mRNA vaccination, finding no meaningful difference after vaccination.\u00a0 Indeed, sperm parameters were on average slightly higher (but not in a statistically\u00a0significant or meaningful way) post-vaccination.\u00a0<\/li>
  3. Fertility rates and birth outcomes after ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 (AZD1222) vaccination<\/a>: This study\u00a0analyzed pregnancies that occurred during clinical trials for AstraZeneca in three countries: UK, Brazil, and South Africa, finding ” no evidence of an association between reduced fertility and vaccination.”\u00a0 Similarly,\u00a0accidental pregnancy rates during COVID vaccine trials for Pfizer, Moderna, and AstraZeneca were similar<\/a>\u00a0between vaccinated and placebo groups in the UK.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    *Fear is so pervasive that an October 2021 Kaiser Family Foundation poll<\/a> found that 66% of parents of 5-11 year olds were concerned that the vaccine might impact their child’s fertility in the future.  The U.S. Surgeon General recently released a Health Misinformation Checklist<\/a> (Figure 1<\/strong>), which I recommend sharing widely to help folks navigate the swarming mis-information and dis-information.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Figure 1. Health Misinformation Checklist (<\/strong>from HHS<\/a>)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \"\"<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Question: Since you have become my default COVID guru, did you have something on COVID-19 vaccines and fertility, particularly how it might affect your chances if you are planning to get pregnant. This keeps coming up as a reason for requesting an accommodation.  How valid is this reason? Answer:\u00a0Fear that the COVID vaccine might negatively affect […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[64],"tags":[77,246,220,247],"class_list":["post-1696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-vaccines","tag-communication","tag-fertility","tag-misinformation","tag-myth","has-post-thumbnail","fallback-thumbnail"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1696"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1696\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1700,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1696\/revisions\/1700"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}