"Up to the end of last week there were 317 whooping cough cases, but the worrying thing is that in just one week it was 112, and the week before that there were 59. We have a two-fold increase, if these rates continue, we will quite quickly catch up to the 1,000 cases that are the psychological border. This can happen up to a month, but this is not a surprise to anyone because every 5 to 10 years there is an increase in whooping cough cases. And if we go back in our history, we can see an epidemic situation from 2014 - 10 years ago, 2009 - also".
This is what the director of the National Center for Infectious and Parasitic Diseases Prof. Iva Hristova said in the studio of "Day ON AIR".
She emphasized that the growth of whooping cough cases is worldwide, not only in Bulgaria.
"A number of Central European countries have thousands of cases. It is due to the fact that there is a cycle in the development of infectious diseases. The question is how big this epidemic situation will be right now. There is a risk of an epidemic, the question is to what extent we have a receptive population. Among young children, we have a good coverage - 92.4% vaccination. It should be 95%, but active measures have been taken to catch up on the missed vaccinations," Prof. Hristova added for Bulgaria ONA IR.
In her words, the picture with vaccinations for 6-year-olds and 12-year-olds is not so good.
"There it is below 90%, they are the most sensitive and currently the most often sick people are in this age range. The most risky group are the little ones, the newborns. Putting the vaccine on the 45th day after birth is timely because there is no point in waiting another 2 weeks when the child can get sick. Adults are not a risk group, especially those vaccinated with the old vaccine that was administered before 2012. It gives very strong immunity and consists of the entire bacterial cell of whooping cough, of course, killed," explained the director of the National Center for Infectious and Parasitic Diseases.
She added that it is good for those who have contact with newborns to be vaccinated.
When asked if pregnant women should be vaccinated in the third trimester, Hristova answered: "This is the way to strengthen the mother's immunity so as to ensure that she will not get sick and for the sake of the child, because it will be fatal to the baby. For our country, such requirements have not yet been introduced, it has not even been discussed. I am not for forced vaccination. The question is for a person to know what the risks are if he doesn't do it, and to make a reasonable decision for himself", the guest also commented.
For unvaccinated children, it is extremely severe.
"The disease begins atypically - a runny nose, a mild cough, a mild fever, then it comes to very severe attacks of coughing, which are suffocating. Then it is too late for treatment. We will give antibiotics, suppress the bacteria, kill them, but the toxins that have been released will continue to cause the symptoms that we see. PCR proves the presence of whooping cough, no waiting. Very often a whole family is infected - the child, father, grandmother, grandfather are infected. Everyone can be a carrier", Prof. Iva Hristova also said.