Cases of whooping cough spike in Florida

Lazaro Aleman editor@riverbendnews.org From the Florida Department of Health (FDOH) show that cases of whooping cough – also known as pertussis – have climbed to a record high for the first nine months of 2025, with 1,295 cases reported as of Oct. 4, compared to 708 for the entirety of 2024. At that, the 708 cases in 2024 represented a significant jump from the 85 cases reported in 2023. The Florida Health Charts (FHC) is a public health data website of the FDOH offered through its Division of Public Health Statistics and Performance Management. Per the FHC, prior to 2023, there were 60 cases of whooping cough reported in 2022, 55 in 2021, and 216 in 2020. And in the previous