The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a vaccine that treats five childhood ailments in a single dose. Pentacel would reduce the number of injections children get before they are 18 months old by as many as one-third.

It is the first 5-in-1 pediatric combination for immunization against diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, polio and Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib). The vaccine is approved for administration as a four-dose series at two, four, six and 15 to 18 months of age. The first dose may be given as early as six weeks of age

An additional dose of vaccine for tetanus, diphtheria and pertusis (Tdap) will be required for North Carolina students. The Commission for Public Health authorized the new rules and also designates that all children before enrolling in school, college or university should get a second dose of vaccine for mumps. Immunization rules also encourage additional vaccine coverage for mumps and pertussis or whooping cough.

Most children are vaccinated against whooping cough before going to kindergarten but the immunity declines after 10 years. Outbreaks of mumps still happen in United States and other parts of the world and it was reported that 2006 Iowa and other Midwestern states outbreak begins on a college campus

The military has immunized more children than private health providers.

Based on data on military care and treatment by private industry providers presented by the Department of Defense at the Military Health System conference on Monday, Air Force health personnel immunized 86 percent of eligible recipients, compared to 84 percent immunized by the highest-rated state and 77 percent nationally

In the first study of its kind, researchers at Saint Louis University have demonstrated immunization with a new vaccine could potentially prevent more than a million cases of pertussis (whooping cough) each year in adolescents and adults.

Most children are protected from pertussis by a series of vaccines in early childhood. But the vaccine protection wanes after a decade or so, leaving adolescents and adults susceptible to the bacterial infection