NBC NEWS – The U.S. is experiencing more than four times as many whooping cough cases compared with last year — a spike that some experts attribute to post-pandemic vaccine fatigue.
“With the increase in vaccine hesitancy that has been going on since the Covid-19 pandemic, we’re seeing outbreaks occurring in kids who are not vaccinated,” said Dr. Tina Tan, president-elect of the Infectious Diseases Society of America.
On Thursday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that 14,569 cases of whooping cough had been reported so far in 2024. That’s a significant increase over last year’s total of 3,475 cases.
According to a CDC spokesperson, preliminary cases reported so far this year are the highest since 2014.
The bacterial illness is officially called pertussis but is often referred to as “whooping cough” because of the sound people — especially babies — make when trying to get enough oxygen despite ongoing coughing fits.
Doctors said the newly reported numbers are likely a vast underestimate of the true spread of the highly contagious respiratory infection.
“For every case of whooping cough we find, there’s probably 10 of them out there that didn’t come to medical attention,” said Dr. Jim Conway, a pediatrician and infectious disease expert at UW Health in Madison, Wisconsin.
The new numbers are a sign that whooping cough cases are returning to pre-pandemic levels, when about 10,000 cases were reported per year, nationally, according to the CDC. Growing anti-vaccine sentiments are contributing to the outbreaks, experts say.
“We’ve been seeing increasing amounts of disease occurring in adolescents and the adult population because they’re not getting vaccinated like they should,” Tan said.
This is an age group that may be particularly vulnerable if they haven’t received a whooping cough booster since childhood.
Protection from pertussis vaccines doesn’t last forever; in fact, boosters are needed every 10 years, according to the CDC …
