Pertussis: Whooping Cough

Despite significant progress in the fight against preventable disease, millions still die needlessly each year. According to UNICEF, originally known as the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund, a vaccine preventable disease is responsible for 2 million fatal infections worldwide each year. About 75% of these deaths occur in children under five years of age. (N) In more vivid terms, UNICEF notes that vaccine-preventable diseases kill a child every 20 seconds. (D) Due to high rates of childhood vaccination, the United States has experienced a dramatic reduction in such deaths. A comparison of the years 1950 and 2010 clearly illustrates the benefits of vaccinations. During this 60-year period, deaths from diphtheria reduced from 410 to 0, tetanus from 336 to 3, pertussis from 1,118 to 26, and polio from 1,904 to 0. Measles deaths dropped from 468 in 1950 to 0 in 2008, the last year a United States death rate was recorded. It’s not surprising that vaccinations have been touted as one of the top ten health achievements of the 20th century by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Yes and no. The vaccination that is available for Pertussis only provides patients with immunity for a limited time (“Whopping cough,” 2017). Due to the fact that the immunity provided through the vaccination is only for a limited time patients must get booster shots in order to maintain their immunity.

The increase in pertussis incidences and morality may include diminished immunity, as childhood pertussis vaccine does not provide lifelong immunity.4 Tdap booster shot at 11 or 12 years old and expected mothers in their third trimester should be given to continue their protective antibodies and those that would be passed to the infant.4 Also, the increased in pertussis may be a decreased usage of the pertussis vaccine, increased doctor awareness and public health reporting.

According to SC DHEC, Division of Acute Disease Epidemiology, 2011 shows in this chart the confirmed and probable Pertussis cases in SC, between 2004 and 2010. “Pertussis tends to become epidemic every 2-5 years; a trend unchanged from the years before vaccine introduction. Outbreaks occur throughout the year in the US (Cherry, 2010; CDC, 2010b). Pertussis vaccination has reduced the case incidence in peak years by more than 95%.”

The Pertussis is something that maybe parents don’t take seriously because it’s a possibility they believe it will never happen to their child. A strong recommendation to help decreases the cases of pertussis is to be stricter with shot requirements such as children can’t enter school or daycare without it and if they aren’t able to afford it because of issues with insurance, they should be offered the shot at a discount rate so that low-income families would qualify for it.

Bordatella pertussis, also known as whooping cough, is a serious and highly contagious respiratory tract infection that is transmitted from person to person. During the pre-vaccine era (1922-1940), that in every 100,000 persons, 150 cases of bordatella pertussis are reported and has to continue to increased in 1980s (Faulkner, Skoff, Martin, Tondella, & Liang, 2015). One study found that pertussis is one of the vaccine-preventable disease in the United States that continues to have high incidence among adolescents and adults and increase mortality in children less than 12 months of age (Chiappini, Stival, Galli, & Martino, 2013). Whooping cough is a public-health problem due to its resurgence in recent

The question left to understand is how to prevent the spread of pertussis to those under one year of age and to those unable to receive the vaccine. Prevention would require different methods to stop the spread of pertussis. Wagner and Clodfelter (2014) explained using simple techniques such as hand

Pertussis is a highly contagious disease that is transferred from person to person. "People with pertussis usually spread the disease by coughing or sneezing while in close contact with others, who then breathe in the pertussis bacteria. Many infants who get pertussis are infected by older siblings, parents or caregivers who might not even know they have the disease" (Vaccines.gov n.d.). According to the CDC symptoms of pertussis usually begin to show up within five to ten days after exposure to the bacteria, but it can take

Whooping cough (pertussis) is a serious, transmissible respiratory infection that is caused by the Bordetella pertussis bacterium. The disease is characterized by cold symptoms at first and develops to prolong coughing with a whooping sound made due to heavy breathing, sneezing, running nose and low body temperature. The disease is airborne and spread when an infected person sneezes or coughs and the close person breathe in the air. The disease mainly touches infants who are below six months old and children who are between 11 to 18 years of age whose immunity against the disease is dwindling, as its effectiveness lasts for four years. A number of Fallsburg Elementary School kids are in this age bracket, hence are likely to contract the disease.

The bacteria is called Bordetella pertussis . B. pertussis causes its most severe symptoms by attaching itself to those cells in the respiratory tract that have cilia. Cilia are small, hair-like organisms that constantly sweep the respiratory tract clean of such debris as mucus, bacteria, viruses, and dead cells. When B. pertussis interferes with this normal, cleansing function, mucus and cellular debris gather and cause constant irritation to the respiratory tract, causing coughing and increasing further mucus building.

Have you had a cough and wondered what it is. After reading this research you will always question yourself and your child. Whooping cough also known as Pertussis is a highly contagious disease. This disease is one of the most commonly occurring in the United States. The Mayo clinic which is a major health care clinic reports that in the first half of the 20th century whooping cough was the leading cause of childhood illness and death in the U.S. How can a cough be so deadly? What do you do to treat whooping cough? Where did the cough come from and what are the symptoms?

Pertussis remains a problem due to a lack of immunity (Teepe, et al., 2015, p. 662). Currently, children are more often vaccinated while adults are not causing a disease incidence shift towards adults (Teepe, et al., 2015, p. 662). The study’s reasoning states “Distinguishing pertussis on clinical grounds alone from other causes of acute cough could help physicians better target testing for

pneumoniae and there chemotactic signals and the host cell’s alternate pathway, invade the alveoli. Also red blood cells are recruited to this site. In the third stage, mostly neutrophils are packed into the alveoli and very few bacteria remain. In the final stage, macrophages eliminate the remaining residue from the inflammatory response. As one can see, the damage which is done to the lung is largely a result of the host’s inflammatory response, which causes the build up of fluids in the lungs. If S. pneumoniae is allowed to persist in the lungs it can then invade the blood, which causes bacteremia. When in the blood it can traverse the blood-brain barrier and infect the meninges, which results in meningitis. S. pneumoniae is also associated with diseases in other parts of the respiratory tract including the paranasal sinuses, which is better known as sinusitis, and the middle ear can become infected, which is known as otitis media. It has also been known to cause peritonitis, an inflammation of the peritoneum, the membrane that lines the abdominal wall, and it is also implicated in causing arthritis.

A study of children in Colorado found that children who were not immunized were 6 times more likely to be infected with pertussis (whooping cough) and 22 times more likely to be infected with measles than their immunized peers (Immunize). Research on this topic has shown concrete proof what vaccination can to for the world. Studies have reported that immunizing kids is a responsible and healthy action that benefits the child, the parent, and the community.

Pertussis has always been a challenge for public health workers and thought to be an illness of the past. It was thought to be practically irradiated in the early eighties due to childhood vaccines. There are many scientific explanations as to why whooping cough is on the rise. First of all, the CDC believes that the vaccinations are not lasting as long as originally expected. Secondly, there are now better testing methods and more cases are being diagnosed being reported on a yearly basis. Next, WHO or the World Health Organization says that since vaccinations only protect against whooping cough, transmission is not blocked the world’s population would not be protected against herd immunity (WHO, 2015). Since a single case of whooping cough can generate more than fifteen other cases,