Professor Karina Butler:

That is a very important question. Such advice will absolutely be needed. It is the exact kind of thing in respect of which we are awaiting the recommendations of the European Medicines Agency, EMA, before giving definite advice. There are no data on pregnancy to date. Pregnant people have been vaccinated. Although pregnant people were excluded from the trials, it is always the case that there are people who do not know they are pregnant or who end up getting pregnant unexpectedly. There were small numbers of pregnant people in the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna trials. We do not have data on the outcomes for those pregnant people yet. There is a mood within the State to start trials. It was a matter of balancing risk. Some felt that pregnant women should be included. We will just have to wait for the information. Pregnant women were not prioritised in this list because of the absence of data. With regard to breastfeeding, there is no theoretical risk involved in breastfeeding but, again, we are waiting for the licence documentation before we give final recommendations.