PREGNANT women in Black and Asian minority communities are most hesitant towards the Covid vaccine, claimed a medic, as hospitals across Birmingham continue to swell with Covid-contracted unvaccinated pregnant women with many requiring intensive care and premature emergency surgeries.
Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust is now considering offering Covid vaccines at the antenatal routine appointments to tackle low take-up, reports said.
About 30 pregnant women have been admitted in Birmingham City Hospital’s intensive care since April, reports said, adding that all of them were unvaccinated.
Three mums-to-be are currently fighting for life in Birmingham City Hospital's critical care units, Birmingham Live reported on Wednesday (4), while in one case a baby has to be delivered recently by a Caesarean surgery and is in neonatal care while the mum is still battling the virus.
Meanwhile, about 60 pregnant women have ended up in the QE, Heartlands, Good Hope or Birmingham Women's hospitals while many more in neighbouring University Hospitals Birmingham and Birmingham Women's and Children's hospitals, reports said.
In all, more than 800 pregnant women reportedly have been hospitalised across Birmingham and the Black Country after contracting Covid-19 in the last three months. In many cases, emergency surgery has to be conducted to save the mum's life.
"We understand women are nervous but it is absolutely vital they come forward for their vaccines,” Dr Sarbjit Clare from Birmingham City Hospital told the media outlet, adding that many women are still in the hospital’s intensive care unit and battling for their lives.
The medic emphasised that the pro-vaccine message is still not reaching minority communities, adding that they are “trying, with the help of respected people in those communities, to get the message through”.
Representative image by OLI SCARFF/AFP via Getty Images
Claiming that pregnant women in Black and Asian minority communities are most hesitant towards Covid vaccine, Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust's director of midwifery Helen Hurst told the media outlet that plans are now being drawn to offer Covid jabs during antenatal appointments to try to get more women to take them up.
Birmingham's case rate is now at around 322 per 100,000 people, down from a high of well over 400 two weeks ago, but still has some pockets of high infection across the city.
Despite a huge push, there are about 330,000 adults yet to take up their first vaccine offer, and around half of the adult population is not yet fully vaccinated, the report said.
Calling all the unvaccinated pregnant women to get the Covid jabs, Hurst said that “initial messages about whether and when to take the Covid vaccine if pregnant certainly caused confusion”.
"But now hundreds of thousands of pregnant women have had the vaccines and the minuscule risks just do not compare. It is the best option for mums and their babies,” she said.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee said Machado was honoured for her efforts to promote democratic rights and pursue a peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy in Venezuela.
Maria Corina Machado awarded 2025 Nobel Peace Prize for promoting democracy in Venezuela
The Nobel Committee praised her courage and fight for peaceful democratic transition
Machado has been in hiding for a year after being barred from contesting Venezuela’s 2024 election
US President Donald Trump had also hoped to win this year’s Peace Prize
VENEZUELA’s opposition leader and democracy activist Maria Corina Machado has been awarded the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee said she was honoured for her efforts to promote democratic rights and pursue a peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy in Venezuela.
Machado, who has been living in hiding for the past year, was recognised “for her tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy,” said Jorgen Watne Frydnes, chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, in Oslo.
“I am in shock,” Machado said in a video message sent to AFP by her press team.
Frydnes said Venezuela has changed from a relatively democratic and prosperous country to “a brutal authoritarian state that is now suffering a humanitarian and economic crisis.”
“The violent machinery of the state is directed against the country's own citizens. Nearly eight million people have left the country,” he said.
The opposition has been systematically suppressed through “election rigging, legal prosecution and imprisonment,” Frydnes added.
Machado has been “a key, unifying figure in a political opposition that was once deeply divided,” the committee said. It described her as “one of the most extraordinary examples of civilian courage in Latin America in recent times.”
“Despite serious threats against her life, she has remained in the country, a choice that has inspired millions,” it said.
Machado had been the opposition’s presidential candidate ahead of Venezuela’s 2024 election, but her candidacy was blocked by the government. She then supported former diplomat Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia as her replacement.
Her Nobel win came as a surprise, as her name had not featured among those speculated to receive the award before Friday’s announcement.
Trump’s hopes for prize
US President Donald Trump had expressed his desire to win this year’s Peace Prize. Since returning to the White House in January for a second term, he has repeatedly said he “deserves” the Nobel for his role in resolving several conflicts — a claim observers have disputed.
Experts in Oslo had said before the announcement that Trump was unlikely to win, noting that his “America First” policies run counter to the principles outlined in Alfred Nobel’s 1895 will establishing the prize.
Frydnes said the Norwegian Nobel Committee is not influenced by lobbying campaigns.
“In the long history of the Nobel Peace Prize, I think this committee has seen every type of campaign, media attention,” he said. “We receive thousands and thousands of letters every year of people wanting to say, what for them, leads to peace.” “We base our decision only on the work and the will of Alfred Nobel,” he added.
Last year, the prize went to the Japanese anti-nuclear group Nihon Hidankyo, a grassroots organisation of atomic bomb survivors from Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The Nobel Peace Prize includes a gold medal, a diploma, and a cash award of $1.2 million. It will be presented at a ceremony in Oslo on December 10, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel’s death in 1896.
The Peace Prize is the only Nobel awarded in Oslo. Other Nobel Prizes are presented in Stockholm.
On Thursday, the Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to Hungarian author Laszlo Krasznahorkai. The 2025 Nobel season concludes Monday with the announcement of the economics prize.
By clicking the 'Subscribe’, you agree to receive our newsletter, marketing communications and industry
partners/sponsors sharing promotional product information via email and print communication from Garavi Gujarat
Publications Ltd and subsidiaries. You have the right to withdraw your consent at any time by clicking the
unsubscribe link in our emails. We will use your email address to personalize our communications and send you
relevant offers. Your data will be stored up to 30 days after unsubscribing.
Contact us at data@amg.biz to see how we manage and store your data.