Hello Everyone
After all of our campaigning and your wonderful support, I’m delighted to tell you that at last there’s been a huge breakthrough in group B Strep testing for pregnant women in the UK. The Department of Health & Social Care has signed off a major clinical trial for group B Strep testing. As they say,
“The new trial will test the effectiveness of two types of screening compared to no screening in 80 hospitals in England and Wales. The results will inform future pregnancy screening policy in the UK”
Although I should say that the trial will also be conducted in Scotland.
This is a crucial step forward in our call for all pregnant women to be offered testing for group B Strep carriage as part of their antenatal care.
The UK does not routinely test pregnant women for group B Strep carriage, unlike many other developed countries, and instead uses a ‘risk-based’ prevention strategy. We believe that this policy is wrong and does not work. The number of babies suffering group B Strep infections has risen not fallen since even before the policy was introduced in 2003. Group B Strep is still the most common cause of life-threatening infection, including pneumonia, meningitis, and sepsis (blood infection), in newborn babies.
But, although this is a huge step forward, it’s crucial that we continue to raise awareness of the threat group B Strep poses to newborns since, although the trial has started, because it's such a large trial, it is not expected to be able to report its findings before late 2023. That means hundreds of newborns still face the horrible and life-threatening danger of contracting group B Strep before any change will be implemented.
With your amazing support, we’ve managed to reach a wider audience than ever before. So, please, if you know any expectant parents or their families, please alert them to the official leaflet on group B Strep, which they should receive from their midwife (or it can be downloaded from the Group B Strep Support’s website). The charity is also continuing its essential work to ensure that Hospital Trusts are following the latest guidelines on group B Strep prevention.
We should be celebrating Edward’s 5th birthday next week - please continue to help making fewer and fewer families’ lives be devastated by group B Strep, in the way that mine was.
Thank you again for your support.
Fiona