Emergency measures against whooping cough: Babies will be able to be vaccinated earlier – Bulgaria

Prime Minister Dimitar Glavchev held an emergency meeting with the Minister of Health Dr. Galya Kondevathe Deputy Minister of Education and Science Emilia Lazarova and the Chief State Health Inspector Associate Professor Angel Kunchev, which the Ministry of Health decided to allow the first immunization against whooping cough should be administered earlier, one and a half months after birth, and not as laid down in the Immunization Calendar – after the baby’s second month.

The reason for these emergency measures is that at the moment, the most registered cases are those under the age of 1 year and the complications at newborns are more frequent.

What is whooping cough and how to protect yourself

Minister Kondeva indicated that the situation is constantly monitored, a the increase in incidence is no surprise for the experts, as such peaks are usually observed in a period between 3 and 5 years. This was also confirmed by Assoc. Kunchev, pointing out that an increase in cases has been observed since the middle of last year in various countries in Europe and around the world. In Bulgaria, the registered cases of whooping cough are 314, compared to 4 for the same period in 2023.

During the meeting it was also discussed the organization in kindergartens and schools, in which they should not be admitted children with symptoms of whooping cough. The authorities call on parents to also be responsible and, at the slightest doubt, stop their children from attending educational institutions and seek medical help.

For her part, Emilia Lazarova commented that in the Ministry of Education and Science are carefully monitoring the situation and daily collect information on the number of quarantined classes from the Regional Directorates of Education. The Ministry of Education and Culture is ready to respond to an increase in morbidity and, if necessary, distance learning will be introduced in an electronic environment for individual classes. Prime Minister Glavchev was confident that the State Matriculation Examinations and the National External Assessment will be conducted normally and no children will be harmed.

The Prime Minister stated that he was satisfied with the measures taken and believes that the institutions are prepared. “We can reassure the public, we are ready to deal with it,” concluded Glavchev.

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