Whooping Cough Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Whooping Cough, including details on symptoms, treatment, vaccines, causes, outbreaks.

Pertussis: review of epidemiology, diagnosis, management and prevention.

Wood N, McIntyre P

National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance of Vaccine Preventable Diseases, The Children's Hospital at Westmead, University of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. nicholw3@chw.edu.au

Bordetella pertussis--the cause of pertussis or whooping cough--is an exclusively human pathogen. Disease elimination by vaccination should, therefore, be possible, but has proved elusive. Many industrialised countries with long established immunisation programs are currently seeing a resurgence of pertussis, despite universal vaccination with high uptake, with the highest burden in the least immunised age groups (infants under 6 months of age and persons over 10 years old). However, low recognition and reporting and insensitive diagnostic tests mean that the true burden of pertussis is still underestimated. Recently, efforts to improve diagnostic yield include the expanded use of polymerase chain reaction and serological tests but both have significant limitations. The range of antibiotics available for treatment and prophylaxis has expanded to include the newer macrolides, azithromycin and clarithromycin, and a range of universal and targeted vaccination strategies have been implemented or proposed. This paper reviews the current epidemiology of pertussis in developed countries, including modes of clinical presentation, diagnosis, management and potential vaccination strategies.

Published 12 August 2008 in Paediatr Respir Rev, 9(3): 201-11; quiz 211-2.
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Articles on Whooping Cough published 1 August 2008:

The nature and character of the transition state for the ADP-ribosyltransferase reaction.   EMBO Rep, 9(8): 802-9.

Exotoxin A (ExoA) from Pseudomonas aeruginosa is an important virulence factor that belongs to a class of exotoxins that are secreted by pathogenic bacteria which cause human diseases such as cholera, diphtheria, pneumonia and whooping cough. We present the first crystal structures, to our knowledge, of ExoA in complex with elongation factor 2 (eEF2) and intact NAD(+), which indicate a direct role of two active-site loops in ExoA during the catalytic cycle. One loop moves to form a solvent ... [Abstract] [Full-text]

Articles on Whooping Cough published 31 July 2008:

Scaling-up vaccine production: implementation aspects of a biomass growth observer and controller.   Bioprocess Biosyst Eng.

This study considers two aspects of the implementation of a biomass growth observer and specific growth rate controller in scale-up from small- to pilot-scale bioreactors towards a feasible bulk production process for whole-cell vaccine against whooping cough. The first is the calculation of the oxygen uptake rate, the starting point for online monitoring and control of biomass growth, taking into account the dynamics in the gas-phase. Mixing effects and delays are caused by amongst others the ... [Abstract] [Full-text]

Articles on Whooping Cough published 23 July 2008:

Comparative genomic profiling of Dutch clinical Bordetella pertussis isolates using DNA microarrays: identification of genes absent from epidemic strains.   BMC Genomics, 9: 311.

BACKGROUND: Whooping cough caused by Bordetella pertussis in humans, is re-emerging in many countries despite vaccination. Several studies have shown that significant shifts have occurred in the B. pertussis population resulting in antigenic divergence between vaccine strains and circulating strains and suggesting pathogen adaptation. In the Netherlands, the resurgence of pertussis is associated with the rise of B. pertussis strains with an altered promoter region for pertussis toxin (ptxP3). ... [Abstract] [Full-text]

Articles on Whooping Cough published 8 July 2008:

Pathology and pathogenesis of fatal Bordetella pertussis infection in infants.   Clin Infect Dis, 47(3): 328-38.

BACKGROUND: Each year, Bordetella pertussis infection causes an estimated 294,000 deaths worldwide, primarily among young, nonvaccinated children. Approximately 90% of all deaths due to pertussis in the Unites States occur in young infants. These children often develop intractable pulmonary hypertension; however, the pathophysiologic mechanism responsible for this complication has not been well characterized, and there have been no detailed descriptions of the pathology of this disease since ... [Abstract] [Full-text]

Articles on Whooping Cough published 27 June 2008:

Protein-protein docking and analysis reveal that two homologous bacterial adenylyl cyclase.   J Biol Chem.

Calmodulin (CaM), a eukaryotic calcium sensor that regulates diverse biological activities, consists of N- and C-terminal globular domains (N-CaM and C-CaM, respectively). CaM serves as the activator of CyaA, a 188 kDa adenylyl cyclase toxin secreted by Bordetella pertussis, which is the etiologic agent for whooping cough. Upon insertion of the N-terminal adenylyl cyclase domain (ACD) of CyaA to its targeted eukaryotic cells, CaM binds to this domain tightly (~200 pM affinity). This interaction ... [Abstract] [Full-text]

Articles on Whooping Cough published 20 June 2008:

Suppression of T-lymphocyte activation and chemotaxis by the adenylate cyclase toxin of Bordetella pertussis.   Infect Immun, 76(7): 2822-32.

The adenylate cyclase toxin (CyaA) released by Bordetella pertussis is an essential virulence factor for colonization of the host. This toxin inhibits migration and activation of phagocytes, thereby preventing bacterial killing. In addition, CyaA interferes with the initiation of adaptive immunity by misdirecting dendritic cell differentiation to a suppressive rather than stimulatory phenotype. Here we show that CyaA directly affects adaptive responses by catalyzing cyclic AMP (cAMP) production ... [Abstract] [Full-text]

Articles on Whooping Cough published 13 June 2008:

Increasing cause of cough among adults.   Emerg Med Australas, 20(3): 280-3.

Cough is a frequent reason for ED consultation. When one considers the epidemiological data, whooping cough must be considered in the differential of subacute cough. Clinical symptomatology is slightly different in the adult and unvaccinated child. An infection by Bordetella pertussis should be suspected when the history shows a persistent cough for more than 1 week in conjunction with other clinical elements. Several methods are available to establish a diagnosis: culture, PCR and bacterial ... [Abstract] [Full-text]

Articles on Whooping Cough published 9 June 2008:

Is the Sequenced Bordetella pertussis strain Tohama I representative of the species?   J Clin Microbiol, 46(6): 2125-8.

Subtractive hybridization was carried out to identify differences between the sequenced genome of Bordetella pertussis Tohama I and those of two recently collected isolates. We identified genetic regions specific to recent isolates, old isolates, and isolates of B. parapertussis and B. bronchiseptica species. We conclude that Tohama I strain is not representative of the B. pertussis species. [Abstract] [Full-text]

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