As ACSH's Ana Dolaskie approaches the final weeks of pregnancy, she is making sure all her vaccinations are up-to-date. This includes the TDAP vaccine (Tetanus-Diphtheria-Pertussis) and influenza shot. And she also wants to makes sure dads, partners, and others who are spending time with baby understand why getting vaccinated is key in protecting a newborn baby against potentially life-threatening illnesses, like pertussis (whooping cough).
Tdap
An outbreak of pertussis, otherwise known as whooping cough, in a Florida pre-school affected children who had been vaccinated almost a frequently as those who were not. The reason: our current vaccine's protection wanes. Therefore, a booster shot is needed.
A new drug for pertussis, or whooping cough, targets the bacteria's deadly toxin. It could be an important player in treating the infection, given that both vaccines and antibiotics are losing their effectiveness.
In 2012, Washington state had an outbreak of pertussis (whooping cough). Nearly 5,000 people mostly babies and children caught the disease. Surprisingly, many of the affected adolescents had been vaccinated on schedule, a new study finds. The recent analysis of that epidemic, published in Pediatrics, reports that the effectiveness of