My terrifying whooping cough ordeal: A&E doctor tells how she was left unable ... trends now
I’m now at Day 23 of the ‘100-day’ cough. The cough that’s meant to last ‘only’ 100 days - though my friend Cath, 50, in Winchester, is now on Day 136. Her 16-year-old daughter has had it too.
We compare symptoms - a cough that leaves you unable to breathe, coughing fits so bad they cause urinary incontinence, broken sleep.
And in my case, every so often my airway temporarily blocks, as a result of spasms of my laryngeal muscles. These laryngospasms may only be short-lived but they are terrifying nonetheless. I also feel absolutely wiped out.
I’m now at Day 23 of the ‘100-day’ cough. The cough that’s meant to last ‘only’ 100 days - though my friend Cath, 50, in Winchester, is now on Day 136. Her 16-year-old daughter has had it, too.
What I have is whooping cough, or pertussis. It started with a mild cough in March, but within days I had severe coughing fits.
And while I’d noticed a few people coughing at the university where I am currently a PhD student, I wasn’t aware of anything doing the rounds.
In fact, as I’ve learned there’s been an alarming surge of cases of whooping cough.
Already in the first two months of 2024, in England and Wales alone there were 1,468 new laboratory-confirmed cases reported by the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), compared with a total of 858 cases for the whole of 2023.
Meanwhile the total number of cases reported (these haven’t been confirmed by lab tests) is currently at 6,384. For the whole of 2023 the number was just 1,578.
And this may be a significant underestimate, as even the UKHSA agrees that: ‘The numbers of lab-confirmed figures will not represent all cases in the UK. Some people with mild disease will not present to primary care.’
Most adults and older children who get whooping cough will feel generally unwell, but will get through it even if it takes weeks to get over the cough. The cough can last around 10 weeks or so, hence the name, the 100-day cough.
But even they can suffer complications such as pneumonia, broken ribs - from the coughing - loss of bladder control and passing out. One of my sisters works as a GP for 111 and says she‘s receiving large numbers of calls from patients saying they are having ‘the worst cough of their lives, with vomiting after they cough’.
Those with some pre-existing health conditions can be at risk of serious problems.
But life-threatening complications are more likely in infants. They might not have a cough, but turn blue through lack of oxygen because it can literally make them stop breathing.
Babies under three months old are most at risk (the first dose of the pertussis vaccine is normally given at two months).
That’s why pregnant women are offered the jab between 16 and 32 weeks of their pregnancy.
Before the pregnancy jab for pertussis was introduced, every year dozens of babies in England alone died from this disease (63 in 2012 – the jab was introduced in the UK in October).
In the first two months of 2024, in England and Wales, there were 1,468 new laboratory-confirmed cases reported by the UKHSA compared with a total of 858 cases for the whole of 2023
The total number of deaths over the next 11 years, to 2023, fell to 21. Each one is an absolute tragedy, but a significant drop in the toll. Out of the 21 deaths, 19 of the babies, or their mothers, had not been vaccinated.
This vaccine is a lifesaver and yet the uptake amongst pregnant women has fallen dramatically, from 74.7 per cent in 2017 to just 59.5 per cent in 2023.
And now the numbers of babies affected is rising fast. In 2022 there were just two reported cases of babies under three months, this rose to 48 in 2023. And in just the first two months of this year, the number is already 52. We know of one reported death so far from the last quarter of 2023.
The infection is highly contagious, spread via bacteria in the air from an infected person coughing or sneezing. The bacteria attach to the tiny, hair-like structures (the cilia) that line the upper respiratory system and release poisons that damage them.
This causes the airways to swell, making it harder to breathe.
Whooping cough is considered so serious that since 1940, it’s classed as what’s known as a notifiable disease - it is one of 34 diseases, mainly highly infectious ones, that need to be notified to official bodies, such as the UKHSA (others include anthrax, leprosy and rabies).
The problem is that it doesn’t seem to be on our radar – patients and medics alike.
When I first became ill, I thought ‘Covid’ but a test was negative and a few days later I posted on X, asking if anyone else had the cough that was keeping me awake at night.
A friend and GP Dr Linda Dykes replied asking if I’d been tested for whooping cough. I was not expecting that.
The last time I’d heard that whooping cough was a ‘thing’ was back in the 1980s when an epidemic was sweeping the country, with warnings that this was potentially deadly for babies. I had two baby siblings at the time and kept asking for reassurance from my mother that they had been fully vaccinated.
GP and journalist Dr Mark Porter told me that the infection is currently ‘more common than official figures suggest’ and pointed out that the disease in previously vaccinated older children and adults tends not to cause the classic ‘whoop’.
‘The most common clues we see are paroxysm of coughing (coughing fits) often interspersed with long periods of normality. It lasts weeks,’ he said.
One morning, I woke up coughing and to my horror, I couldn’t inhale. I could feel a block in my throat. I waited a few seconds believing it would self-resolve as before. It didn’t
After that I went to the GP because getting the right antibiotics helps kill the bacteria causing the infection, and after 48 hours of treatment you’re then safe to be with others. If it gets to 21 days of coughing, there’s no point in antibiotics because the bacteria will have died, leaving behind the cough that lingers.
Fortunately my GP knew about the surge and prescribed me antibiotics. A few days later I also got a call from the UKHSA, checking if I’d been in contact with pregnant women, babies or healthcare workers.
Over two weeks after a throat swab and blood tests to check if it is whooping cough, I’ve still not got my results back.
According to the UKHSA: ‘With increased whooping cough activity in the population, associated testing has also increased.’ Further confirmation, in my view, there’s been a big surge
