Vaccination while breastfeeding: To do or not to do?

Washington: A recent study has claimed that there is no harm in administering routine vaccinations to breastfeeding mothers.

However, the study published in the journal Breastfeeding Medicine said that only smallpox vaccine and, in some circumstances yellow fever vaccine, are the vaccines having potential to cause harm to infants. 

In the article, 'Maternal Vaccination and Breastfeeding', Philip Anderson, reviewed all of the most common types of vaccines, including inactivated and live attenuated types for the unsubstantiated concern that they would cause harm to a nursing infant or interfere with the infant's response to early childhood vaccinations.

Included in the scope of Dr Anderson's review are routine vaccines such as influenza, diphtheria, pertussis and tetanus (DPT), varicella and measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR).

The article also focuses on vaccines related to exposure or special risk factors, such as hepatitis A or hepatitis B, and speciality vaccines including cholera, yellow fever, smallpox, rabies, and typhoid.

"As Dr Anderson concludes in his timely and important article, there are no risks associated with giving breastfeeding mothers routine and most other standard vaccinations, including measles, and, in fact, there are benefits for both the mothers and infants," says Arthur I. Eidelman, Editor-in-Chief of Breastfeeding Medicine.

These benefits include the transfer to the infant of maternal antibodies and enhanced antibody response and less vaccine-related fever following infant vaccination, as Dr Eidelman explained in the accompanying editorial entitled 'Guidelines for Vaccinating Breastfeeding Mothers'.

Dr Eidelman further noted that "not only is there no harm in administering routine vaccinations to breastfeeding mothers, but one can and should include nursing mothers in any emergency measles immunisation campaign, such as the recent emergency declared by the New York City Health Department."