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Recording available 2/16-5/2
Recording available 2/16-5/2
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Poster Session 1

Category: Infectious Diseases

Poster Session 1

(201) Maternal Asthma and Offspring Immunity: A Link to Long-Term Infectious Morbidity?

Wednesday, February 11, 2026
10:30 AM - 12:00 PM  

    Submitting Author and Presenting Author(s)

  • HB

    Hagar Brami, MD

    Soroka
    0, HaDarom, Israel

    • Coauthor(s)

  • Gil Gutvirtz, MD, MHA

    Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Soroka University Medical Center, Ben-Gurion University
    Metar, HaDarom, Israel

  • Tamar Wainstock, PhD (she/her/hers)

    Department of Epidemiology, Biostatistics and Community Health Sciences, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev
    Beer Sheva, HaDarom, Israel

  • Eyal Sheiner, MD, PhD

    Deichmann Lerner Full Professor of Obstetrics & Gynecology; Chairman of the Division of OBY&GYN
    Soroka University Medical Center, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben‑Gurion University of the Negev
    beer sheva, HaDarom, Israel

Objective:
Asthma is a common chronic respiratory condition among reproductive age women, driven by immune system responses. In pregnancy, asthma is known to impact short-term maternal and perinatal outcomes. However, the long-term consequences of asthma on the offspring remains largely unexplored. We sought to evaluate whether maternal asthma during pregnancy is associated with increased long-term infectious morbidity in the offspring, using data from a large population-based birth cohort.

Study Design:

A population-based cohort analysis was conducted, including all singleton deliveries at a tertiary hospital that took place between 1991 and 2021. We compared the long-term infectious morbidity of offspring born to mothers with and without asthma. A Kaplan-Meier survival curve was used to assess offspring cumulative infectious morbidity. A Cox proportional hazards model was used to control for confounders.

Results:
Out of the 232,476 births included in the study, 2,875 (1.4%) were to mothers with asthma. Compared to offspring of non-asthmatic women, those of asthmatic mothers had significantly higher rates of viral and bacterial infections as well as respiratory, gastrointestinal and ear-nose-throat infections, accumulating to a higher rate of total infectious morbidity (Table). The cumulative incidence of infectious morbidity over time was also significantly higher in children of asthmatic mothers (Figure). A Cox regression analysis, controlling for maternal and gestational age, diabetes mellitus, hypertensive disorders and cesarean delivery, found that maternal asthma was an independent risk factor for long-term infectious morbidity in the offspring (aHR 1.16, 95% CI 1.11-1.21, p< 0.001).

Conclusion:

Maternal asthma was independently associated with increased long-term infectious morbidity in offspring, suggesting a possible alteration in immune development due to in-utero exposure to a chronic inflammatory environment. These findings underscore the need to further explore the impact of maternal asthma on offspring health to elucidate the underlying mechanism.