childhood diseases -
pertussis or whooping cough

Pertussis is the medical name for whooping cough

Whooping cough is an infectious bacterial disease that mainly affects children. It is spread by coughing and sneezing.

Symptoms will appear one to two weeks after your child has contact with whooping cough. They include catarrh, mild fever, coughing and loss of appetite, and can last for one to two weeks. Your child will then suffer coughing fits, in the form of a series of short coughs followed by an involuntary drawing in of breath. This produces the whooping sound that gives the cough its name. The coughing is usually worse at night and after feeding. Sometimes, this coughing can be followed by bleeding from your child’s nose and mouth, and also by vomiting. This stage lasts two weeks, and she is infectious throughout.

Over the following two to three weeks, the symptoms slowly decline, but the cough may persist for many weeks. Very rarely, whooping cough leads to severe complications, which are listed below.

Babies, particularly premature babies, are the most vulnerable to whooping cough, as it seems that they do not get natural immunity from their mothers. In children under two years old, death will result in 1 to 2 % of whooping cough cases. The peak age for whooping cough is three years, but for children over two years old, it is not a life-threatening illness, with only about 1% of cases needing hospitalisation. If your child gets whooping cough, she will be infectious for about a month after symptoms first appear, so it is important to keep her isolated from infants.

The worst cases of whooping cough are seen in countries where there is a poor standard of living.

Whooping cough complications

Fatalities are very rare in children over 6 months of age.
Pneumonia affects 1 in 100 whooping cough children, and can lead to permanent lung damage.
Pneumothorax (a collapsed lung).
Bronchiectasis (a widening of the airways to the lungs).
Middle ear inflammation.
Encephalitis (a swelling of the brain).

What is the treatment for whooping cough?

Antibiotics are not very effective, but are prescribed to stop any further infections, and to limit the period during which your child is infectious. There is no real cure apart from time.