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February 23rd, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda WEDNESDAY, Feb. 22 (HealthDay News) — U.S. health experts
recommended Wednesday that all adults get vaccinated against whooping
cough (pertussis), an infectious bacterial disease that triggers
uncontrollable coughing and is especially dangerous to infants.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention‘s Advisory
Committee on Immunization Practices voted to expand the vaccination
recommendation to include all adults, including those aged 65 and older.
Specifically, the panel recommended that adults aged 19 and older who have
not been vaccinated with the Tdap vaccine should do so.
Tdap protects against whooping cough (pertussis) in older children and
adults. It also protects against diphtheria and tetanus. All three
illnesses are caused by bacteria, and are potentially deadly diseases.
Children have been vaccinated against whooping cough since the middle
of the last century.
Dr. Jennifer Liang, a CDC epidemiologist, explained that the agency had
already recommended adult vaccination in 2005 but at the time the advisory
did not extend to adults age 65 and older because “there wasn’t any
pertussis vaccine available for this population.”
However, “there was recognition that pertussis isn’t just a childhood
disease and adults and adolescents get it and pass it to infants,” Liang
added. Current adult Tdap vaccine coverage is less than 9 percent, she
noted.
What’s changed, she said, is that “last year one of the Tdap products
was approved for use in those 65 and older. So this recommendation is
really just to update that and broaden the recommendation to all
adults.”
Tdap is licensed for single use, Liang said, and “because it’s a new
vaccine adults should also get it.”
Last September, the CDC and the American Academy of Pediatrics each
issued revised recommendations for the so-called Tdap vaccine, which
protects against whooping cough (pertussis) in older children and adults.
The latest recommendation takes the September guidelines a step
further.
Infectious disease expert Dr. Marc Siegel, an associate professor of
medicine at New York University in New York City, said he agrees with the
new recommendation.
“The original shot only lasts 10 years,” he said. In addition, there’s
a growing problem with pertussis outbreaks in the United States, he
noted.
“Adults are often carriers or spreaders with low-grade or full-blown
infections, which can be passed on to infants,” Siegel said. “The
pertussis vaccine can be given as part of the Tdap series every 10
years.”
In 2010, more than 21,000 people in the United States got whooping
cough, the highest number since 2005 and one of the highest numbers in
more than 50 years, federal health officials said.
A whooping cough outbreak in 2010 in California sickened more than
9,100 people and killed 10 infants. That rate of illness was the highest
recorded in the state since 1947, according to the CDC.
Whooping cough — which gets its name from the “whooping” sound
children make when they cough — is easily transmitted and causes severe,
uncontrollable coughing. It mainly affects older children and adults, but
can be a particularly serious threat to infants who are too young to be
immunized. Although children aged 2 months and older receive a similar
vaccine known as DTaP, which protects against the same three diseases,
pertussis is often transmitted by older, unvaccinated family members,
friends and relatives.
According to the CDC, whooping cough is most dangerous for babies —
more than half of infants younger than 1 year old who get the disease have
to be hospitalized. About one in five infants develops pneumonia, and in
rare cases (one in 100) the disease can be deadly, especially in
infants.
“Changes in recommendations for pertussis vaccination have come about
as a consequence of the re-emergence of whooping cough,” Dr. Len Horovitz,
a pulmonary specialist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, told
HealthDay. “Vaccination is critical in the pediatric age group
because of the higher rate of lung damages, morbidity and mortality of
this preventable disease.”
More information
The Nemours Foundation has more about whooping cough.
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