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CHAPEL HILL, N.- (WNCN) – A pertussis epidemic in a primary school led Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools administrators to send seven people home.
The Orange County Health Department has confirmed pertussis cases, commonly known as pertussis, in six students and a teacher at Glenwood Elementary School. Tracy Sanders, the CHCCS nurse coordinator, said the Department of Health's staff had informed the school system that a case had been confirmed in a student's home.
"The Glenwood nurse was aware of the first thing one morning and she was sending the children home the same day with a type of cough, especially if she was severe or had a fever," said Sanders.
"The nurse works closely with the health department and monitors children for coughing, especially if they have a severe cough and in close contact with the first diagnosed child, and calls these parents and suggests that they do so. a follow-up doctor of first resort. "
Sanders stated that a second-year student was the first to get sick and to have transmitted his cough to his clbadmates, to a teacher and to at least one other student on a school bus, as well as to a student. to a teacher. Some of the sick children have been treated and have already returned to school with the doctor's agreement.
"We would like parents to be more cautious when they send their children to school if they have cold symptoms, they have a fever, or have a fever." they are coughing, "she said.
Most children are vaccinated before the start of school and receive a vaccination reminder in middle school. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that pertussis vaccines are 80-90% effective.
Some adult vaccines for tetanus and diphtheria also include a pertussis booster in Tdap and DTaP vaccines, but there are also vaccines that leave out the pertussis part. Health professionals recommend these injections every ten years.
Dr. Gregory Mosteller, an emergency physician who is also medical director of the UNC Rex Urgent Cares, said that whooping cough usually began with symptoms similar to those of a cold or a viral illness although it is a bacterial infection.
"It may sound like a cold until it's not," said Mosteller.
"You can have a runny nose, you can have a mild fever and a mild cough, and that's usually in the first two weeks so that it can be mistaken for a simple cold," he said. .
"Then you start coughing, coughing so violently that you breathe all the air, and then take a deep breath to catch the air in your lungs, giving a clbadic darling sound."
Mosteller said that this came after an incubation period of one or two weeks and that doctors hoped to treat the disease with antibiotics in the first three weeks. He said that most people's symptoms were lessening and more contagious after about four weeks.
Infants are more susceptible to severe symptoms.
"It is very dangerous in young children under 12 months of age, children who are not fully immunized.They can have high mortality and morbidity, and many of them may need to 39, be admitted to the hospital, "said Mosteller.
Chapel Hill-Carrboro City school spokesman Jeff Nash said things were resuming their normal course at Glenwood Elementary School. Chapel Hill Mayor Pam Hemminger attended clbades on Thursday morning.
It is treatable with antibiotics.
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