North Texas

Pertussis Scare at North Texas Middle School

A North Texas school is on high alert Monday morning after a student was diagnosed with pertussis (whooping cough).

Parents of students at Tidwell Middle School in Roanoke found out Friday that a child at the school has the disease.

The highly contagious respiratory disease is airborne, giving it the potential to spread among students in close quarters.

"Pertussis is known for uncontrollable, violent coughing which often makes it hard to breathe. After fits of many coughs, someone with pertussis often needs to take deep breathes which result in a 'whooping' sound. Pertussis most commonly affects infants and young children and can be fatal, especially in babies less than 1 year of age," according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Coughing fits from pertussis can last from one to six weeks and can last as long as 10 weeks.

It takes anywhere between five days and three weeks for symptoms to show up.

So far, only one student is sick.

According to the CDC, there were just over 48,000 cases of pertussis reported in 2012 though many more go undiagnosed or unreported.

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