Researchers plan study on immunization acceptance among Inuit women

Bordetella pertussis is the bacteria that causes whooping cough, an infectious disease of the lungs and throat that spreads easily from one person to another. (FILE IMAGE)

A new project taking place in Nunavut and Nunatsiavut with researchers from the Canadian Centre for Vaccinology aims to better protect Inuit babies against whooping cough.

They’re doing this by encouraging vaccination against this disease, known also as pertussis, which can be deadly to babies under the age of six months.

Right now, pregnant women in Nunavut can also be vaccinated against influenza to help protect their babies from getting the flu.

And soon they should also be able to get immunized against RSV, short for “respiratory syncytial virus,” a serious lung infection. Experts have wanted to see that vaccine offered in Nunavut for years.

“There are going to be more vaccines in pregnancy,” said Dr. Joanne Langley from Dalhousie University in Halifax, in a telephone interview.

Langley was in Iqaluit last week to talk to a cross-section of health workers and government officials about the new project, which she said “will help us figure out how they (vaccinations) should be introduced.”

First, pregnant women have to buy into the idea that the vaccination they are receiving is safe and that it can pass on protection to their babies.

To that end, the researchers plan to conduct a three-year study to determine the attitudes and beliefs of community elders, health-care providers and pregnant women about maternal immunization, Langley said.

Their goal is to explore the usefulness of the Tdap, a vaccination that protects against whooping cough, as well as diphtheria and tetanus, and to look at what influences a woman’s decision to be vaccinated.

Babies can get vaccines to protect them from infectious diseases as early as at two months of age, but babies less than six months old are too young to get all the doses required to protect them from catching whooping cough, Langley said.

That’s why the best way to protect these newborns is to give their mothers the whooping cough vaccine while they are pregnant, she said.

But some mothers can be afraid of getting vaccinated during pregnancy.

For a woman who has already been vaccinated, a booster during pregnancy can also increase her response from previous vaccination, which will be passed on to her baby, Langley said.

That’s important, because the highest mortality from whooping cough takes place during the first six months of life, she said.

Nunavut has suffered several outbreaks of whooping cough, the most recent being those that hit Arviat and Rankin Inlet in 2017.

Untreated whooping cough infections can lead to pneumonia, seizures, brain damage and, in serious cases, death.