Rubella becomes a nightmare for many pregnant women

Rubella has plagued thousands of pregnant women and claimed lives of a great deal of unborn babies since this summer.

A mother forced to give up her child because of rubella

An outbreak of the virus started in northern Vietnam in the middle of the year. The disease has forced thousands of pregnant women to decide whether or not to abort their child. However, even with new rubella diagnosis methods, the number of pregnant women who opt to take the test is still relatively small.
Doctors and difficult decisions
Associate Professor Le Anh Tuan, who is also Deputy Director of the Central Obstetrics Hospital, shared, “I’ve never seen such a great number of pregnant women undergoing abortions. Since January 2011, over 2,000 pregnant women have been hospitalised for rubella. Over half of them have been compelled to have abortions, due to possible effects of the disease on their babies.”
According to Tuan, at one time, the hospital diagnosed about 200 pregnant women per week with rubella. But many of these diagnoses were too late. The tests are able to confirm whether or not the patient is infected, but cannot pinpoint the time of infection.
It is also difficult for doctors to give advice on the effects the disease might have on the unborn child. These women are given advice based on past international research, he said.
Tuan added that doctors often advise infected mothers to undergo abortions if they are less than 12 weeks pregnant.
“In many cases, we just give them advice without suggesting abortion, but the mothers sometimes decide to abort on their own because of possible deformities,” he said.
Tuan said that a woman in Hanoi who got pregnant, after several in-vitro fertilisations, started showing hives in the 12th week of pregnancy. She was advised to go to Singapore for a test. A short time later, under the advice of doctors, she came back to the hospital for an abortion.
Despite prevention efforts, the Central Obstetrics Hospital recorded 20 newborn babies with the virus, four of whom died just after birth.
Since late June, the hospital has started using new testing methods with a 95% accuracy rate, but which cost VND1.5 million (USD72.7).
To date, the hospital has used these new testing methods on about 40 expectant mothers. They should be carried out between five and seven weeks of infection, although many expectant mothers find it difficult to define the moment of infection. Others are hesitant to take the test because they are close to the time of maternal leave.