ABSTRACT
This chapter illuminates shifting maternity care practices and protocols among community- and hospital-based providers across the United States (US) in response to the COVID-19 pandemic during 2020. Between August and October 2020, people conducted an email survey of maternity care providers to discover how their practices and attitudes towards COVID-19 had shifted in response to new evidence. The prior coronavirus epidemics of SARS and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), and experiences with Ebola and Zika viruses, compounded the fear and trepidation about rates and routes of transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and its specific impacts on pregnant women. Providers had to respond to patient fears and misinformation, as well as to a fundamental lack of evidence regarding how SARS-C0V-2 would impact fetal, maternal, and newborn health and outcomes. A systematic review and meta-analysis of 30 population-based studies conducted in September 2020 revealed that 95% of all obstetric patients were asymptomatic.
