SEATTLE (AP) — Michelle Razore's infant daughter spent 72 days in the hospital and almost died from whooping cough in 2010.
The mother of three from Clyde Hill, Wash., still doesn't know how Natalie got sick and has spent the days and months since then trying to convince everyone she meets to get vaccinated.
Although Razore put Natalie on the path toward whooping cough immunity by getting her all her baby shots, infants need to get a series of shots before they are immune from the disease.
And a study published in Wednesday's New England Journal of Medicine found that the protective effect weakens dramatically soon after a youngster gets the last of the five recommended shots around age 6.

