Also known as pertussis, whooping cough is an extremely contagious respiratory disease characterized by a series of severe coughs at the end of which the patient has to draw in a deep breath, creating a whooping sound. Caused by the organism Bordetella pertussis , whooping cough is primarily a childhood disease although may be far more prevalent in adults than health experts believe. The disease is dangerous and can be fatal.

The great Persian physician Avicenna (980-1037) referred to a disease that may have been whooping cough around 1010. The first definite account of the disease was recorded by the French physician, Guillaume de Baillou, in 1578, and the first clear and thorough description of it came from Thomas Willis (1621-1675), an English physician, in 1675. Another English physician, Thomas Sydenham, introduced the term whooping cough that same year.

Descriptions of the disease were of no help in treating or...