Reacción a "Reactions: suggest monitoring side-effects of RSV vaccines associated with preterm births"

While it is right that the safety of new vaccines must be given the highest priority, the response to this BMJ News Analysis should be measured.  While the Pfizer and GSK RSV vaccines are based on similar technologies, they are not the same and the clinical trials were done at different times in different populations.  It therefore should not be assumed that issues with one automatically equate to the same problems with the other.  Until clearer information comes out about the potential confounding effects, for example, of uptake of other vaccines by women in the GSK study, it remains possible that the safety signal was not due to the vaccine itself but other uncontrolled factors.

“RSV is a major global problem in newborns and, to maximise prevention, it is important that safe maternal vaccination be available as an alternative strategy to directly giving babies antibody injections.  Nevertheless, I completely agree that it will be essential for close monitoring to take place if the Pfizer vaccine is approved and taken up by larger numbers of pregnant women than could be assessed in the trials.