The U.S. has recorded over 32,000 whooping cough cases this year, compared with around 5,100 as of mid-December last year. Infants are most vulnerable to the bacterial infection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Whooping cough cases in the U.S. have reached the highest annual total in a decade, with as many cases tallied in the last 12 weeks as in the entire rest of the year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As of mid-September, about 14,500 cases had been recorded nationwide<\/a> since the beginning of the year. That number climbed to more than 32,000<\/a> as of Dec. 14, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That’s a six-fold increase from the same time in 2023, when more than 5,100 cases had been recorded. The total for 2022 was even lower, at roughly 3,000\u2002<\/a>cases<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Experts attribute the high case tally to a combination of factors. For one, whooping cough cases dropped to levels far lower than average during the Covid pandemic, so a jump back to pre-pandemic patterns was expected. However, this year\u2019s total is significantly higher than 2019\u2019s, likely due to waning vaccine protection, lower vaccination rates and improved testing, they said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Also known as pertussis, whooping cough is a bacterial infection that affects the upper respiratory system. Its spread typically follows a seasonal pattern, with a peak in the fall or winter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Early symptoms can resemble a common cold \u2014 cough, fever and a runny nose \u2014 but after a week or two, patients often develop aggressive cough attacks during which it’s difficult to breathe. The term whooping cough is a reference to the high-pitched \u201cwhoop\u201d sound that some infected people make as they inhale after a coughing fit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “They don\u2019t have time in between those coughs to take a breath,” said Dean Blumberg, chief of pediatric infectious diseases at University of California, Davis, Children\u2019s Hospital. “Sometimes, if it\u2019s so severe, the kids end up being intubated or on a ventilator so that they can get oxygen.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Infants are the most vulnerable to whooping cough, with the highest risk of getting infected and of serious complications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s most severe in the youngest kids, so certainly those less than a year, and especially those less than 6 months of age,\u201d Blumberg said. \u201cI personally have seen a patient who\u2019s died from pertussis this year, and I\u2019ve seen several that have been in the ICU.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n He added that most of the whooping cough patients he’s seen have been unvaccinated and that he\u2019s noticed a decline in vaccine coverage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe\u2019ve seen more vaccine hesitancy and, unfortunately, we\u2019ve seen more kids who are unimmunized getting pertussis,\u201d Blumberg said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The CDC recommends whooping cough vaccines, which help protect against pertussis, diphtheria and tetanus<\/a>, for everyone in the U.S., starting at 2 months old. Infants should get doses of the DTaP shot, as it’s known, at 2, 4 and 6 months, followed by booster shots when they are between 12 and 15 months old and again at 4 to 6 years old.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One dose of a different formulation of the shot, the Tdap vaccine, is also recommended for preteens between 11 and 12 and for adults every 10 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Whooping cough vaccination rates in the U.S. remain high, but they have declined over the last five years or so. Whereas more than 94% of children born between 2018 and 2019 had received at least three doses of the DTap vaccine by their second birthdays, the rate fell to around 92.5% for those born between 2020 and 2021, according to a CDC report published in September<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Among kindergarteners, the share who had gotten state-required vaccinations \u2014 including DTap \u2014 fell from 95% in the 2019\u201320 school year to below 93% for the 2023\u201324 school year, the CDC found in October<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Of children under 1 who were hospitalized with whooping cough last year, only around 29% had gotten at least three vaccine doses, according to the CDC<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The vaccine’s protection fades over time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Santina Wheat, a professor at Northwestern University\u2019s Feinberg School of Medicine, said most of the whooping cough patients she\u2019s seen have been vaccinated tweens and adults.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I think we\u2019re probably seeing some of the impacts of the waning immunity,” she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Wheat added that an improved ability to diagnose whooping cough is probably also contributing to the United States’ higher case total.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “We now have better testing options, so I’m able to run a panel that looks for a variety of different things, and pertussis is one of those,” she said. “Numbers are up, but I also think some of it is just us recognizing it more frequently.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nonetheless, Blumberg urged parents to take whooping cough’s threat seriously and get children vaccinated or boosted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey\u2019ll say, \u2018Pertussis is just a cough and kids get over it,\u201d he said, adding: \u201cWe need clear and consistent messaging about vaccines. Many people have forgotten about them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n