[Acellular vaccines (DTPa/dTpa) against whooping cough, protection duration].

Introduction: An increase in whooping cough in most of the developed countries has been detected in the last decade.

Objective: To determine whether the administration of dTpa vaccine instead of DTPa fifth dose is contributing to the appearance of these cases.

Methods: A descriptive study based on cases of whooping cough reported during an epidemic period in the city of Alicante in the first 5 months of 2014.