Maternal SARS‐CoV‐2 infection: The potential vertical transmission of SARS‐CoV‐2 and impact on neonates: A review

Abstract

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‐CoV‐2), a large, lipid‐enveloped, single‐stranded RNA virus, is a highly contagious virus that caused coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19), declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization on March 11, 2020. Pregnant women are usually considered at high risk for infectious diseases, including COVID‐19. Maternal SARS‐CoV‐2 infection can adversely affect the pregnancy and birth outcomes, such as abortion, intrauterine growth restriction, and prematurity. Some meta‐analysis suggested that the outcomes of newborns are different between symptomatic and asymptomatic pregnant women but similar in asymptomatic and SARS‐CoV‐2 negative group. Maternal infection increases the risk of vertical transmission; also the presence of SARS‐CoV‐2 or its RNA in maternal samples in some case reports raised the possibility of intrauterine transmission. Also, contact transmission during delivery and postnatal transmission are discussed. Although most infected newborns are asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic, there are case reports of severe neonatal SARS‐CoV‐2 infection, including cardiorespiratory failure and death. Otherwise, some studies suggested that the COVID‐19 pandemic was associated with a reduction for preterm birth during the pandemic compared with the prepandemic period. We conduct this review to try to make a conclusion about the vertical transmission of SARS‐CoV‐2 and impact on neonates due to Maternal SARS‐CoV‐2 infection.