Pertussis: Adults may need booster

KREFELD, Germany, Sept. 26 (UPI) -- A German scientist warns pertussis, commonly known as whooping cough, is not just a childhood disease.

Although risk of infection can be greatly reduced by vaccination, the pathogen Bordetella pertussis is highly infectious and an infection may occur at any age.

Marion Riffelmann of the Krefeld Institute for Infectious Diseases in Krefeld, Germany, says the number of reported attacks in older children and in adults is going up.

Pertussis, Riffelmann says, usually occurs in unvaccinated babies and it is the most frequent fatal infectious disease in newborns. Nevertheless, the number of reported attacks of whooping cough in schoolchildren, adolescents and adults has markedly increased in recent years.

Roughly 0.2 percent to 0.5 percent of adolescents and adults fall ill each year with pertussis and a protracted cough. About 25 percent of adult patients develop complications, such as seizures, inflammation of the middle ear or circulatory collapse.

Although the standard treatment with macrolide antibiotics interrupts the chain of infection, it does not influence the symptoms, Riffelmann says.

The most effective pertussis prophylaxis is vaccination with a combination vaccine. However, regular boosters are needed, as the vaccination protection continuously decreases after five years, Riffelmann reports in Deutsches Arzteblatt International.