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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is urging pregnant women to get vaccinated against COVID-19 as the Delta variant continues to spread across the country.
The CDC updated its guidance after reviewing safety data from 2,500 women who received at least one dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine before 20 weeks of pregnancy.
"The vaccines are safe and effective, and it has never been more urgent to increase vaccinations as we face the highly transmissible delta variant and see severe outcomes from COVID-19 among unvaccinated pregnant people," CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said in a statement.
The CDC said that pregnant women "are more likely to get severely ill with COVID-19" and could suffer other complications during pregnancy, including miscarriages or stillbirths.
"Evidence about the safety and effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccination during pregnancy has been growing. These data suggest that the benefits of receiving a COVID-19 vaccine outweigh any known or potential risks of vaccination during pregnancy," the CDC wrote on its website.
The agency added that there is no evidence that the vaccines cause fertility problems in women or men.
The new guidance comes as hospitals are dealing with a surge in patients with COVID-19.
"This is by far the worst we've seen in the pandemic," Dr. Jane Martin, an obstetrician with Ochsner Baptist Medical Center in New Orleans, told NBC News. "It's disheartening, and it's exhausting. It feels like it doesn't have to be like this."
Dr. Martin said that her hospital has admitted "multiple critically ill pregnant patients" every day during the past two weeks.