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Complications of chickenpox in pregnancy

Authoring team

These are mostly as a result of infection of the foetus which may result in:

  • the varicella syndrome when infection occurs early in pregnancy (1)
    • risk of fetal varicella syndrome
      • risk of the syndrome in children exposed to chickenpox in utero is around 0.5% if maternal chickenpox develops at 2-12 weeks of pregnancy
      • 1.4% if it develops at 12-28 weeks
      • 0% if it develops from 28 weeks onwards
      • overall risk in the first 20 weeks of pregnancy is 0.91%
  • neonatal chickenpox can be severe when the maternal rash appears between five days before delivery and two days after delivery. Mortality may be as high as 30% without active treatment (2)

In the mother, smokers in the second or third trimester are at a particularly high risk of pneumonitis.

Notes:

  • there is no evidence that uncomplicated chickenpox in the mother significantly increases the likelihood of spontaneous abortion during the first 20 weeks of pregnancy (3.0% in one study) or intrauterine death after the 20th week (0.7%) (3)

Reference:


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