Last updated on August 24th, 2019 at 04:38 pm
The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services reported that a three-week old child died of whooping cough (Bordetella pertussis) last week.
As the report states, a child cannot be vaccinated with DTaP (the vaccine for diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis) until they are about 2 months old. However, because infants are susceptible to whooping cough, all adults, children, friends, relatives, everyone, who is in contact with that child should be vaccinated against pertussis, a process called cocooning.
When an antivaccination militant says “my unvaccinated child won’t hurt your child”, this is where their lies are uncovered. For example, an unvaccinated older child may have whooping cough, and the parent take him or her to a pediatrician for the horrible cough, and that infected child passes it to other children.
In this case, the NC Department of Health and Human Services has not reported how the child may have contracted the deadly disease, so we can only speculate.
The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) recommends (pdf) that children should get 5 doses of DTaP, one dose at each of the following ages: 2, 4, 6, and 15-18 months and 4-6 years. Those children who are not completely vaccinated according to these ACIP recommendations for pertussis are considered to be “undervaccinated.”
Whooping cough is a serious disease that has significant complications for children:
- 1 in 4 (23%) get pneumonia (lung infection)
- 1 or 2 in 100 (1.6%) will have convulsions (violent, uncontrolled shaking)
- Two thirds (67%) will have apnea (slowed or stopped breathing)
- 1 in 300 (0.4%) will have encephalopathy (disease of the brain)
- 1 or 2 in 100 (1.6%) will die
Even in adults, there are substantial complications, such as broken ribs from coughing, that can have a significant impact on the overall health of the individual.
Despite the medical understanding of the consequences of whooping cough, a study published in March 2013 showed that the rate of undervaccination increased significantly in several US managed care organizations dropped significantly between 2004 and 2008. The reasons for undervaccination included parental choice (vaccine refusal) and other typical reasons, including lack of health care and medical contraindications to vaccination.
Several studies have shown a reduced protective effect of the pertussis vaccine (probably as a result of the acellular version of the vaccine) which may have lead to the resurgence of pertussis in the USA. These issues have lead to a few myths that include the belief that children who are vaccinated with DTaP are actually at higher risk of contracting pertussis (fully refuted). The vaccine quack website, Age of Autism, pushed other myths about DTaP vaccination. These various ignorant beliefs about the pertussis vaccine has strongly contributed to the reduction in the uptake of the pertussis vaccine amongst the most vulnerable children.
A recently published study examined the risk of pertussis infection in undervaccinated children, between the ages of 3 and 36 months. The researchers examined medical records of over 300,000 children enrolled in 8 midwest US managed care organizations, which usually have detailed and centralized health care records of patients. They identified 72 children with pertussis (confirmed by a laboratory analysis, where the reviewer was blinded to vaccine status). This infected group was compared to 144 non-infected children randomly chosen to match the demographics of the 72 infected with pertussis. The results were dramatic:
- An unvaccinated child was 2.25X more likely to contract pertussis than a child with just one vaccinations.
- They were 3.41X likely to get pertussis than a child with two vaccinations.
- They were 18.56X more likely to contract the disease than a child with three vaccinations.
- And, most dramatically, they were 28.38X more like to get pertussis than a child who is full vaccinated.
- In fact, the overall risk of a non-vaccinated child contracting pertussis is 4.36X than children who have had any number (1-4) of DTaP vaccinations.
This remarkable and statistically significant reduction in risk of contracting pertussis, especially after being fully vaccinated at 36 months (4 immunizations) fully refutes and debunks the belief, pushed by vaccine deniers, that somehow vaccinated children are the ones catching and passing along the disease.
In fact, the authors clearly conclude that:
Our data suggest that undervaccination, whether due to parental refusal of vaccines or other barriers to health care, is an important contributing factor, especially given the documented increasing rates of undervaccination in 2 recently published studies. Undervaccination with DTaP vaccine places infants and young children at increased risk for pertussis. Although not supported by our data, it is also possible that undervaccination indirectly threatens the health of surrounding populations that are at high risk for serious complications from pertussis, such as infants who are too young to be vaccinated.
We believe that our study supports on-time vaccination with DTaP vaccine, as recommended by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices.
It’s useless to engage intelligently with the ignorant vaccine refusers that populate the backwoods of the internet. But if you’re undecided about vaccines, or you keep hearing the lies of the antivaccination gang, listen to real science. Pertussis can kill, it can harm, and it can put your precious child into an intensive care unit in a hospital. This will cause you sleepless nights, unbelievable stress, and untold economic damage. Your child will be in pain. Your child’s pain will break your heart.
But we have scientific evidence, at the highest possible level of reliability, that shows vaccinating your child with all age-appropriate vaccines will make their life better, and as a consequence, make your own life better. And it saves lives, and could have saved the life of a 3-week old North Carolina child.
You can listen to the lies of those who suffer from the Dunning-Kruger effect, individuals without any education or any real scientific knowledge but who have an illusory belief in their own superior knowledge, and risk your child’s health. Or you can listen to hard-working, well educated, and very devoted individuals, who make their life’s goal to saving children’s lives and who produce evidence strongly in support of the effectiveness of pertussis vaccines. Yes, there’s a choice, but the evidence, the highest possible quality evidence, sits on the side of the safety and effectiveness of vaccines.
If you need to search for accurate information and evidence about vaccines try the Science-based Vaccine Search Engine.
Key citations:
- Glanz JM, Newcomer SR, Narwaney KJ, Hambidge SJ, Daley MF, Wagner NM, McClure DL, Xu S, Rowhani-Rahbar A, Lee GM, Nelson JC, Donahue JG, Naleway AL, Nordin JD, Lugg MM, Weintraub ES. A population-based cohort study of undervaccination in 8 managed care organizations across the United States. JAMA Pediatr. 2013 Mar 1;167(3):274-81. doi: 10.1001/jamapediatrics.2013.502. PubMed PMID: 23338829. Impact factor: 4.140.
- Glanz JM, Narwaney KJ, Newcomer SR, Daley MF, Hambidge SJ, Rowhani-Rahbar A, Lee GM, Nelson JC, Naleway AL, Nordin JD, Lugg MM, Weintraub ES. Association Between Undervaccination With Diphtheria, Tetanus Toxoids, and Acellular Pertussis (DTaP) Vaccine and Risk of Pertussis Infection in Children 3 to 36 Months of Age. JAMA Pediatrics. 2013 September 9. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2013.2353. PMID: Impact factor: 4.140.
- Pertussis vaccination: use of acellular pertussis vaccines among infants and young children. Recommendations of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP). MMWR Recomm Rep. 1997 Mar 28;46(RR-7):1-25. Erratum in: MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep 1997 Aug 1;46(30):706. PubMed PMID: 9091780.
- Rohani P, Drake JM. The decline and resurgence of pertussis in the US. Epidemics. 2011 Sep;3(3-4):183-8. doi: 10.1016/j.epidem.2011.10.001. Epub 2011 Oct 14. PubMed PMID: 22094341.
- Shapiro ED. Acellular vaccines and resurgence of pertussis. JAMA. 2012 Nov 28;308(20):2149-50. doi: 10.1001/jama.2012.65031. PubMed PMID: 23188034.
- Witt MA, Katz PH, Witt DJ. Unexpectedly limited durability of immunity following acellular pertussis vaccination in preadolescents in a North American outbreak. Clin Infect Dis. 2012 Jun;54(12):1730-5. doi: 10.1093/cid/cis287. Epub 2012 Mar 15. PubMed PMID: 22423127.
