Thanks to MAHA Stupidity, Whooping Cough Is Back

Here’s a story from Mississippi Free Press to illustrate that life goes on—or doesn’t—despite the Big Showdown in Washington, D.C.

A baby in Mississippi has died of whooping cough, the Mississippi State Department of Health announced on Monday, marking the state’s first whooping cough death in 13 years. The infant was less than two months old and was not old enough to receive the pertussis vaccine, the agency said. Mississippi has seen 115 pertussis cases from Jan. 1, 2025, to Sept. 29. Through all of 2024, the state had only detected 49 whooping cough cases, MSDH reported. Mississippi State Health Officer Dr. Dan Edney said that Mississippi’s last whooping cough deaths were in 2008 and 2012.

“We do believe that declining vaccination rates are impacting this,” he told reporters on Sept.