September 20, 2024 – Whooping cough is on the rise within the United States, with 4 times as many cases reported to this point this 12 months in comparison with all of 2023.
The CDC said As of September 14, 14,569 cases had been reported, in comparison with 3,475 for all of 2023.
In the week ending September 14, 291 recent cases were reported. Most cases were in New York (44), followed by Ohio, Pennsylvania and Oklahoma with 38 each. This is essentially the most cases in a single week since 2015.
Whooping cough, also called pertussis, is a respiratory disease that’s spread by coughing, sneezing, or respiratory in close proximity to a different person. Babies are given the DTaP vaccine to guard against whooping cough, diphtheria, and tetanus. Because the vaccine's effectiveness wears off more quickly against whooping cough than against the opposite two diseases, booster shots are beneficial about every ten years.
But many teenage children don’t receive booster vaccinations, and this age group is liable for the whooping cough outbreak.
“With the increasing vaccine hesitancy that has continued since the COVID-19 pandemic, we are seeing outbreaks in children who are not vaccinated,” said Tina Tan, MD, president-elect of the Infectious Diseases Society of America NBC News.
Additionally, persons are not social distancing as they did at the peak of the COVID pandemic, when whooping cough cases were declining.
“Pertussis rates dropped dramatically when we were all wearing masks, and now this huge increase is bringing us back to pre-pandemic levels, and probably a little bit higher,” said Dr. Thomas Murray, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Yale Medicine. said in a press release from the college. “It is a contagious respiratory virus that can spread quite quickly through the population.”
A bunch of FDA advisors is planned to meet on Friday to debate the event of more practical boosters against whooping cough.