Delineating late foetal systemic and lung immune responses following vaccinations against respiratory pathogens given during pregnancy

在怀孕期间接种疫苗是一种令人兴奋的策略，可以帮助保护出生后前四周的婴儿免受感染。虽然疫苗可以在3个月大的时候接种，但他们最脆弱的时候是生命的第一个月。然而，在出生后的第一个月，婴儿对大多数疫苗接种都不能产生足够的反应。为了克服这一问题，母亲接种的疫苗用于为婴儿在出生时提供一定程度的免疫力。尽管英国皇家学院在怀孕期间常规推荐3种针对肺部感染的疫苗（针对流感、百日咳和COVID-19），且没有安全性问题，但接种率很低，尤其是较新的疫苗。疫苗犹豫的部分原因是担心疫苗可能不会有益于胎儿免疫系统或伤害婴儿。由于我们对妊娠后期胎儿免疫系统的了解非常少，因此很难开发新的疫苗，也很难研究未出生婴儿的免疫系统。有时怀孕在怀孕后期终止，因为婴儿有严重的，限制生命的问题。我的研究将从这些未出生的孩子身上采集健康样本，以研究血液和肺部的免疫系统。我的研究将使用尖端技术来研究免疫细胞的类型，它们的功能以及它们如何受到母体疫苗的影响。

Vaccines given in pregnancy are an exciting strategy to help protect babies in the first four weeks of life against infections. Whilst vaccines can be given to children at 3 months, the time when they are most vulnerable is the first month of life. However, in the first month of life babies cannot generate a sufficient response to most vaccinations. To overcome this, vaccines given to mothers are used to provide baby with a degree of immunity at birth. Despite 3 vaccines against lung infections (against flu, whooping cough, and COVID-19), routinely recommended in pregnancy by the Royal College of Obstetrics and Gynaecology in the UK, with no safety concerns, uptake is low, and particularly poor for newer vaccines. Part of the vaccine hesitancy stems from concerns that the vaccine may not benefit the foetal immune system or harm the baby. It is also difficult to develop new vaccines as our understanding of the foetal immune system in the last stages of pregnancy is extremely poor.There is difficulty in studying the immune system of the unborn child. Sometimes pregnancies are terminated in late pregnancy because the baby has a severe, life-limiting problem. My study will take healthy samples from these unborn children in order to study the immune system of the blood and lung. My study will use cutting edge technology to study the types of immune cells, their function and how they are influenced by maternal vaccines.