Whooping cough cases are on the rise in the United States, according to data from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.
As per the CDC data, there have been 8,485 cases reported in 2025, twice of those recorded during this time last year. The increase in cases is linked to falling vaccination rates and growing vaccine hesitancy, especially among school-aged children
The illness peaks every two to four years, experts said. The number of cases fell during COVID-19 because of masking and social distancing.
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Whooping cough is especially dangerous for infants and can be fatal, as evidenced by the recent deaths of two babies in Louisiana and a 5-year-old in Washington. The CDC recommends vaccination starting at two months of age, with boosters every 10 years for adults and during pregnancy to protect newborns. States like Pennsylvania and Michigan are also seeing a notable rise in cases.
“There’s unfortunately been increasing anti-vaccine sentiment in the United States,” said Dr. Ericka Hayes at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. “Our recovery is not nearly as quick as we expected it to be and we needed it to be. And again, when you fall below 95% for vaccinations, you lose that herd immunity protection.”
Health experts warn that declining vaccine uptake risks reversing decades of disease prevention progress. “Last year, the United States had about 35,000 cases of pertussis and about 10 deaths, give or take,” Chad Neilsen, head of infection control and prevention for Nemours Children’s Health in Florida, told ABC News. “If we continue this pace, we’ll have close to 70,000 cases of pertussis, making it one of the worst years we’ve seen in the US in quite some time.” If that occurs, it would be the highest number of whooping cough cases recorded since 1950, CDC data shows.
Currently, there are two types of vaccines to protect against whooping cough: diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis (DTaP) vaccine for babies and children younger age 7 and tetanus, diphtheria, and pertussis (Tdap) vaccines for children aged 7 and older, adults and pregnant women.
