Black and Hispanic pregnant women in Philadelphia are five times as likely as white and Asian women to have been exposed to the novel coronavirus, according to a new study led by Scott Hensley, an associate professor of microbiology in the Perelman School of Medicine, and Karen Marie Puopolo, an associate professor of pediatrics and neonatologist at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. The study was published in Science Immunology.
“Pregnant women are fairly representative of community exposure, and these data provide more evidence, on top of what we already know with COVID-19, that health and socio-economic equity are inextricably linked,” Hensley says. “Hopefully, this will help lead to policies that address these inequities.”
The research team measured levels of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies to estimate rates of exposure to the novel coronavirus in pregnant women cared for at two Philadelphia hospitals. They found that, overall, 6.2% of these women possessed antibodies to the virus, but with significant variation across racial and ethnic groups—9.7% in Black women, 10.4% in Hispanic/Latina women, 2.0% in white/Non-Hispanic women, and 0.9% in Asian women.
Researchers say these data can inform clinical practice and care for pregnant women during the coronavirus pandemic, and be used to better understand the prevalence of the virus in the community, and how socioeconomic factors and inequities may affect its spread.
“Identifying the disparity in virus exposure will ideally help lead to the discovery of what is causing these differences, including factors rooted in systemic racism, and inform public health measures aimed at preventing further infections,” Puopolo says.
This story is by Melissa Moody. Read more at Penn Medicine News.
