INFORMATION FOR WOMEN WHO HAVE A COMMON COLD DURING PREGNANCY OR BREASTFEEDING

What is a common cold?

Common cold is viral infection that affects mostly the upper respiratory tract, giving you nasal congestion, a swollen inner lining of your nose (rhinorrhea), a runny nose typically with sneezing, and often a dripping of mucus from the back of the nose down to your throat, which can cause a sore throat and coughing or a throat tickle that causes small coughs or an urge to clear your throat. You also can feel tired and have a low-grade fever. Colds are caused by a group of viruses called rhinoviruses, which have in common the characteristic that they thrive at the temperature of the lining of your nose, which is a little bit colder than core body temperature, but they don’t survive at core body temperature, so the infection does not penetrate deeper into the body. Each time that you catch a cold, your immune system learns how to protect you against that particular rhinovirus, but you catch colds throughout life because each cold is caused by a different rhinovirus. Because there are so many, there are always colds circulating around the community that you have never had, so you are susceptible throughout life, including while you are pregnant. Generally, a cold lasts 7-10 days, but sometimes your symptoms can drag on longer because you have actually been infected with more than one rhinovirus at different points in time.