A child receives a routine vaccination at First Georgia Physician Group Pediatrics in Fayetteville, Ga., in 2021. Infectious disease experts say children aren’t staying up-to-date on their whooping cough vaccines because of less personal care during pandemics.
Angie Wang/AP
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Angie Wang/AP
The number of whooping cough cases in the United States has quadrupled since last year, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday.
Infectious disease experts attribute the drop in vaccination rates to whooping cough — also known as pertussis — epidemics.
“Children are not seeing their health care providers during COVID, and they may have done some telemedicine, but we can’t vaccinate through the computer,” said Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease specialist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. “We haven’t caught everyone up to their usual vaccination levels yet.”
The whooping cough vaccines, called DTap and TDap, also protect against diphtheria and tetanus, providing the best protection against the disease and its complications.
Previous research has raised concerns about the short-term effectiveness of whooping cough vaccines, with some experts expressing the need for new vaccines.
Cases of people with whooping cough are returning to pre-pandemic levels, with more than 10,000 cases typically seen in the United States each year. The CDC said in July. Company registered 14,569 cases this year So far, it has increased from 3,475 total cases registered last year.
Pennsylvania, New York and California lead all states in the number of cases. In Pennsylvania, 2,008 infections have been reported this year, twice as many as California.
Early symptoms of whooping cough can be mistaken for colds and other respiratory illnesses, which is why the illness isn’t caught until it’s more serious.
That diagnostic challenge makes inadvertent transmission easier, said Dan Nold, MD, professor of pediatric infectious diseases at Doernbecher Children’s Hospital in Portland, Ore.
“The first week or so of the illness looks like any other respiratory illness,” he said, “when in reality, it could be pertussis, and you’re only infecting people around you.”
What distinguishes whooping cough from other respiratory illnesses is a persistent and fitful cough that lasts at least three weeks and lasts for many people. Months, Nolt said.
Vanderbilt’s Schaffner said the irritated mucous membranes often cause debilitating coughing fits.
“It’s not one or two, it’s a whole series of coughs so you can’t breathe,” he said. “And when you finally, really tired, come to the end of your coughing fit, you inhale — and that’s the ‘oops.'”
However, children may not have a severe cough, but rather difficulty breathing or stop breathing intermittently.
The CDC recommends the DTaP vaccine for infants and children younger than 7 years of age. Older children and adults are advised to get the vaccine and booster every 10 years.
The most severe cases are in children, whose small airways become blocked more easily, Schaffner said. Since infants cannot be vaccinated until 2 months of age, the CDC recommends that pregnant women be vaccinated At the beginning of the last trimester of each pregnancy To protect newborns.
