The epidemic is finally coming to an end. Whooping cough monitoring indicators have experienced a “significant decrease” since September, Public Health France (SPF) announced this Friday, November 22.
“Although the level of circulation of the bacteria remains at higher levels than in previous years, these reductions herald the end of the 2024 cycle,” estimates the public health agency in a press release.
The number of emergency visits has been decreasing since mid-August “for all age groups and in all regions,” indicates the SPF.
43 deaths since the beginning of the year
These findings come after eight months of an epidemic that has reached very high levels. In a scientific article from the Pasteur Institute published in September, the current epidemic is considered “unprecedented for at least 25 years.” The last significant episodes of whooping cough date back to 2017 and 2012 but their intensity was much lower than the current episode.
In terms of whooping cough alone, health authorities report 156,000 cases registered since the beginning of the year and 305 hospitalizations of children under 12 months of age. To date, the 2024 epidemic has caused the death of 43 people: 23 children, 20 of them under 1 year old, and 19 adults, 13 of them over 80 years old, according to the SPF.
Whooping cough, a highly contagious disease of bacterial origin, is usually benign, but can cause serious, sometimes fatal, respiratory and neurological complications in babies.
“Possible resumption of the epidemic” in spring 2025
The SPF highlights in its press release that “whooping cough is more common in spring and summer.” Health authorities therefore expect that pertussis indicators will continue to decline at least until next spring, which could be marked by “a possible resumption of the epidemic.”
Thus, Public Health France “recalls the importance of vaccination of pregnant women, recommended since April 2022, to protect newborns and young infants and respect the vaccination schedule.”
Source: BFM TV
