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Previous Volume 353:1615-1617 October 13, 2005 Number 15 Next

	Since this article has no abstract, we have provided an extract of the first 100 words of the full text and any section headings.

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There is increasing evidence and awareness that pertussis is not just a disease of children. Although most severe disease and almost all mortality occur in young infants, the overall disease burden is increasingly shifting to adolescents and adults.¹ There have been large outbreaks of pertussis among adolescents who had both classic pertussis symptoms and prolonged illness with cough.² Pertussis is less well characterized in adults than in adolescents but has been associated with up to 20 percent of prolonged illness with cough. Studies have suggested that the clinical severity of pertussis in adults increases with age.³

This change in epidemiologic . . . [Full Text of this Article]

Source Information

From the Departments of Pediatrics and Microbiology and Immunology, Dalhousie University and the IWK Health Centre, Halifax, N.S., Canada.

This article has been cited by other articles:

• Lin, Y.-C., Yao, S.-M., Yan, J.-J., Chen, Y.-Y., Chiang, C.-S., Wu, H.-S., Li, S.-Y. (2007). Epidemiological shift in the prevalence of pertussis in Taiwan: implications for pertussis vaccination. J Med Microbiol 56: 533-537 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• (2005). Acellular Pertussis Vaccine Efficacious in Adolescents and Adults. JWatch Infect. Diseases 2005: 1-1 [Full Text]  
• (2005). Pertussis Vaccine Works in Adults. JWatch General 2005: 2-2 [Full Text]