State health officials warn that Texas is on track to see the highest number of whooping cough cases it has registered in 50 years if occurrences of the disease continue at the current rate.
As of this week, Texas has reported 1,670 cases of pertussis, better known as whooping cough, to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The Texas Department of State Health Services stresses that the disease is serious, especially in young children.
Two whooping cough deaths have been reported this year in the state – children too young to be vaccinated, according to the department’s website. Thirteen percent of the whooping cough cases have required hospitalizations, with almost all of them involving infants younger than 1 year old.
Babies are especially vulnerable to the infection because they don’t have full protection against it until they’re 6 months old, when they receive the last of three shots.
Dr. Robert Lapus, pediatric emergency services director at Children’s Memorial Hermann Hospital, said two infants suffering from whooping cough recently were admitted to the hospital. Both were younger than 6 months.
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The disease was common, with hundreds of thousands of cases reported annually, until the 1940s when the vaccine was introduced. For about 25 years, fewer than 5,000 cases were reported annually in the United States. The numbers started to climb again in the 1990s.
The Centers for Disease Control reports there were 159 whooping cough deaths in the United States from 2004 to 2011. Almost all the deaths – 141 of the 159 – were babies younger than 3 months old.
More than 41,000 cases were reported across the country in 2012, with 18 deaths. In Texas, there were 2,218 cases, with 159 in Harris County, 32 in Montgomery County, 12 in Fort Bend County and 10 in Galveston County.
As the story notes, low vaccination rates and higher infection rates are a national problem. As that CDC link suggests, the Affordable Care Act ought to help, since more people will be able to get primary care, which of course includes vaccinations. The bottom line is that we all need to be aware of these things. The vaccinations we got as kids don’t last forever. It’s a good idea to check and see what shots you may need now.