PONE-D-22-04342Rubella virus IgM and IgG antibodies with avidity in pregnant women and outcomes at a tertiary facility in Ghana: a cross-sectional studyPLOS ONE

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Partly

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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Reviewer #1: The overall quality of the work is good. The authors have provided sufficient information to understand the topic of interest, explain the steps of the research process clearly, and provided a good discussion of the study results. I do not have further comments to submit and I believe this work is ready for publishing.

Please accept my best regards,

Reviewer #2: Introduction (page 6): second line- specify 9-14 ? months or years

Study design and population : last sentence of first paragraph (page 7) : questionnaires were administered ‘to’ obtain … add ‘to’.

Why were pregnant women in the first trimester of pregnancy not included ?

Add a sub heading of ‘sample size’

Reference formula used for sample size determination and give the name if possible.

Why the age limit of 45 years ?

Data and blood sample collection (page 8): nothing was described on blood sample collection. Title should be revised

Testing for rubella virus specific antibodies and avidity (page 9 : on the first line, precise if plasma or serum was used for analyses.

Detection of Congenital Rubella Syndrome : Is the national Cardiothoracic center part of the Korle Bu Teaching hospital ? if not include under study area.

Results : define exposed and non-immune in the first sentence.

Socio-demographic characteristics : What does number of children represent ? are they children living in the house during the current pregnancy or the number of children the participants had?

Tables are named 5.1, 5.2, 5.3…. it should be corrected to be Table 1, 2, 3, …

Why was avidity test done on all participants ?

Show avidity results of participants that were IgM posisitve

Table 5.5 indicates IgM positivity. How many participants were IgM positive ?

Non-immune clients : specify if rubella vaccine given to participants during pregnancy.

Follow-up data for babies : define SARS-COV-2

Discussion : page 28, first sentence not clear.

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

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Rubella virus IgM and IgG antibodies with avidity in pregnant women and outcomes at a tertiary facility in Ghana

PONE-D-22-04342R1

Dear Dr. Sagoe,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

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Kind regards,

Ray Borrow, Ph.D., FRCPath

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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Reviewers' comments: