Dozens of parents are coming forward online to warn others about a nasty infection dubbed ‘walking pneumonia‘ that doctors are struggling to spot.
Among them is a mother from Georgia, who revealed her young daughter was rushed to the ER and intubated after her cough from the disease did not ease.
‘Mycoplasma [walking] pneumonia is no joke,’ she said online. ‘This came without warning! She was just seen at her pediatrician 24 hours beforehand.’
‘Walking pneumonia’ is a bacterial infection that can cause excessive coughing, but normally does not leave patients unable to carry out their daily tasks.
In recent years, however, it has led to more children being hospitalized, which experts say may be linked to Covid lockdowns blocking children’s exposure to good germs and, as a result, weakening their immune systems.
At the same time, parents say doctors are struggling to diagnose the condition on time, often writing it off as a viral infection, a cold or the flu — which delays timely treatment for children.
Parents are also urging others to ensure their children get an X-ray, which can reveal ‘white spots’ on the lung leading to a pneumonia diagnosis.
Among these parents was mother-of-two Ashley Hudson in California, revealing she was initially told her 11-year-old son had a viral infection.
Mother-of-three Whitney Wilkinson said she took her son to urgent care after he had a lingering cough
Ms Wilkinson said her son was diagnosed via an X-ray after he spent a week suffering from a cough
Dr Tibisi Villalobos, from Pennsylvania, warned: ‘We’re seeing more severe illness. We’re seeing children that have fever for days, with a cough, not feeling good, and ending up in the hospital, even in the ICU, requiring oxygen and critical care.’
Ms Hudson revealed on TikTok that her 11-year-old was so sick he was ‘coughing stuff up’ and could ‘barely keep his eyes open’ after being hit by the disease and suffering from a cough and 103F fever.
She took him for a check-up for his cough and flu-like symptoms about two weeks ago, and was told by doctors that he had a viral infection and sent home with instructions to take Tylenol to ease the illness.
But five days later, her son took a sudden turn and became ‘extremely sick.’
‘He gets 103F fever, he is extremely sick, he can barely keep his eyes open, he has the worst migraine, and he was just like, “I need to sleep”. He had no appetite, he’s coughing stuff up,’ she said.
‘[His cough]… doesn’t sound like he is wheezing or anything like that, it is more like congestion, common cold, viral infection, and then with the [other symptoms].’
She rushed him back to his pediatrician, where a second assessment was performed and doctors also ordered an X-ray of his lungs.
The mother was told she would get his results in about an hour, but five minutes later she got a call from their doctor confirming the pneumonia diagnosis.
Alma Geddes, center, is pictured with her brothers as she stays in a Baltimore hospital where she was treated for Mycoplasma pneumonia
The little boy has now been prescribed antibiotics, which should be able to battle off the infection. But Ms Hudson says her one-year-old now appears to be unwell.
There are reports of surging cases of ‘walking pneumonia,’ caused by the bacteria Mycoplasma pneumoniae, coming in from across the US.
Last week, health officials in parts of Wisconsin and Illinois said they were detecting an increase among children. Then, doctors in Fort Worth, Texas, and Washington DC followed suit.
And over the weekend, there were also reports of rises coming out of Lehigh County in Pennsylvania and in Houston, Texas.
But at the same time, parents report doctors are repeatedly missing the infection or misdiagnosing the disease.
In another case, a mother-of-two from Texas revealed how her 10-year-old had also been diagnosed with walking pneumonia — but only after a visit to the ER.
Stephanie, who lives in San Antonio, said her son had been sick with a cough for about two weeks when she took him to the ER.
Doctors there were unable to diagnose his illness, but then she booked an appointment with a pediatrician who said he had ‘walking pneumonia’.
Alma, three, was one of several children doctors at the Greater Baltimore Medical Center have seen so far this year with pneumonia
She said: ‘Lately, my son, his cough, kind of started off as a small cough, but it just got worse and worse. He was sleepy, you could tell, he was just uncomfortable.
‘My 10-year-old finally sees his pediatrician, he goes to his visit and he is diagnosed with this “walking pneumonia”. Apparently, these pediatricians and doctors are seeing a lot of cases.’
It is likely the boy has now been prescribed antibiotics to battle off the infection, but that has not been confirmed.
In its alert last week, the CDC warned cases of children with ‘walking pneumonia’ being admitted to the ER were on the rise — an unusual trend because ‘M. pneumoniae historically hasn’t been recognized as a leading cause of pneumonia in this age group’.
It said that from March to October the proportion of children aged two to four years old who were discharged with the disease surged from one to 7.4 percent.
And among those ages five to 17 years old, the CDC said the proportion rose from 3.6 to 7.4 percent over the same period.
Mother-of-three Whitney Wilkinson was also among those to warn over pneumonia, revealing her son had been diagnosed with the disease after struggling with a cough for a week.
Unlike viruses such as flu and RSV that tend to strike in the colder months, outbreaks of mycoplasma infections can also occur in seemingly random clusters in schools and on military bases at any point during the year.
The most prominent symptom is a lot of coughing, but others include a fever that fluctuates, along with lethargy and fatigue.
While most patients have lung congestion that can be detected with a stethoscope, not all do. Additional symptoms may include headaches, sore throat, and, less frequently, a rash.
