Cases have also been found in other parts of the country, including Alberta and Nova Scotia.

A Delaware County resident has been confirmed as having pertussis or whooping cough.

Kreidler said it is best in all cases where a child is sick to keep them home instead of sending them to school and potentially infecting others. The school district is working with the Randolph County Health Department on a plan to address the cases.

He reported Wednesday that a phone message was delivered to the home of every child at both Ramseur schools Tuesday evening to provide parents as timely a notice as possible.

In the letter, Health Director MiMi Cooper advises parents at the two schools that their child “may have been exposed to someone with pertussis (whooping cough)” during the September 1-22 period.

Also, it is important to do what they say is cocooning or making sure that anyone who would be in contact with a baby has the whooping cough vaccine. “The problem was a lot of them had some pretty intense side effects”.

“If we weren’t vaccinated we would just be seeing Pertussis routinely happening everywhere, all the time”, Buchan says. “Fewer side effects, but they don’t last quite as long”. Students are required to get a whooping cough booster shot in the 7th grade. “You still shop in our community, you still go out and eat in restaurants, so, if you expose someone who is vulnerable, then that’s something nobody wants to be responsible for”. “This time of year, people will think it’s allergies or something else that’s going on before that distinctive cough that comes with pertussis begins”.