A type of antibiotic that is frequently prescribed instead of penicillin has been found to have some links to birth defects if taken during the first trimester of pregnancy. Macrolide antibiotics are widely used to treat common bacterial infections – often for those with an allergy to penicillin – but experts have urged caution for their use during early pregnancy. Nearly a third of women are prescribed antibiotics at some point in their pregnancy, with around one in 10 antibiotic prescriptions being for macrolides.
A study of 104, 605 children from University College London, which looked at data from 1990 to 2016, assessed a potential link between macrolide antibiotics and malformations at birth. They found that, of the 8,632 children born to women who had taken macrolides during the first three months of their pregnancy, 186 had major malformations – mainly in the heart. For women who…
