Pertussis commonly referred to as whooping cough a highly contagious bacterial disease may affect infants by up to 50 percent via parents. A latest research suggests that the tetanus vaccine Tdap provided to both adolescents and adults helps curb incidences of whooping cough. While the traditional form of the tetanus booster Td should be administered to all adults every 10 years, those above the age of 65 can be subjected to Tdap once again.
Previously conducted experiments concluded that adults widely seem to transfer the infection to children. In spite of accurate administration of the vaccine available at hand, the rate of whooping cough cases were probably rising significantly. Though adults are often exposed to whooping cough, due to much larger diameter in the airways the swelling and mucus probably fail to affect tremendously. On the other hand, among infants the swelling and mucus production possibly hampers ability to breathe resulting in suffocation and death.
Whooping cough can be apparently treated with antibiotics with positive results in 14 days, but only when proper action is taken. Prevalence of pertussis in adults and the incidence of spreading the illness to children can be supposedly reduced by taking booster shot every 10 years. Shannon Bolon, MD, a UC Health family medicine physician who sees patients at the Wyoming Family Practice Center, and colleagues believe that simply taking necessary precaution can help decline the occurrence of this illness.