Whooping cough is surging in N.L. Here are the symptoms
The early part of the infection is kind of like a cough and cold. So people sometimes have a mild cough, low grade fever, itchy watery eyes, not too different from a regular viral upper respiratory tract infection. But the difference with pertussis versus other viral respiratory tract infections is that impertussis, the cough gets worse as opposed to getting better. So that first phase lasts for a couple of weeks and then it moves into the phase where. People would commonly associate the symptoms of pertussis like you’ll see pictures or videos of children, cough, cough, cough, cough, cough until they sometimes throw up or and sometimes at the end of that coughing spell they’ll go, which is where the the term whooping cough came from. It was that big, quick inspiratory spell and that that stage can sometimes last for six or eight weeks and that’s followed by a phase of convalescence or when people start to improve so that the whole process can take quite some time, especially in people who are unvaccinated or under vaccinated.