The highly contagious bacterial disease, also known as whooping cough, has had a major comeback this year.
Confirmed cases in England, which totalled 858 last year, hit 555 in January alone and rose to 913 in February New figures suggest the resurgence of whooping cough is going strong and could be getting worse. Health authorities recently confirmed there were close to twice as many cases of the disease in January and February alone as there were in the whole of 2023. Also known as the ‘100-day cough’, or pertussis, the highly contagious bacterial infection spreads through coughs and sneezes.
The surge has been linked to a steep post-Covid drop in the number of pregnant women accepting a vaccine that protects their babies against the disease which was introduced in 2012. Uptake dropped from 70% in September 2017 to 58% in September 2023, falling as low as 20% or 30% in some London communities, UKHSA figures show. According to Metro.co.uk calculations, some areas appear to be affected worse than others – although overall case numbers are too low to draw solid conclusions.
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