He always got headaches... but this time was different. I was told my son, 8, would die 20 hours later

When Ashlee Dahlberg's eight-year-old son Liam got off the school bus last month and complained of a headache, she thought little of it. Prone to allergies, these were a fairly regular occurrence for her middle child, Ashlee told the Daily Mail, and so she gave him some ibuprofen as usual. But overnight Liam's condition gradually worsened, with the head pain intensifying and his temperature spiking to 103F. The next morning, Ashlee's husband Erik rushed him to ER where doctors revealed that their son was showing signs of a serious brain infection. Liam was transferred to a children's hospital in Chicago, where he was sedated but never regained consciousness. After doctors performed a lumbar puncture, they discovered that he had bacterial meningitis and that it was too late to save him. When the Dahlbergs asked the medical team how it was possible to lose their boy less than 20 hours from the first symptoms, they were told that he had contracted a little-known and viciously deadly infection. Doctors fear that haemophilus influenzae type B, also known as H. flu or Hib, could become more common as vaccine uptake drops. Liam's mother Ashlee (pictured together) said the pain was 'indescribable' as she lay with him after the medical team turned off life support Your browser does not support iframes. Talking about the subsequent events, Ashlee told this website: 'We were hoping for a miracle and kept him on life support so that family and friends could visit for the next two days. 'With no improvements, we took him off of life support on Monday, April 28, and he passed peacefully at 3.35pm.' Despite its similar-sounding name, haemophilus influenzae is not a flu virus but a bacterium. While many healthy people carry it in their nose or throat without symptoms, H. flu can turn lethal if it enters the bloodstream, causing the body to attack organs. It is particularly dangerous for young children, whose immune systems are still developing. H. flu is now rare due to widespread Hib vaccination, which has brought yearly cases in the US down from 20,000 in the 1980s to just 50 today. However, vaccine uptake has been dropping since the Covid pandemic and doctors warn that it could make a deadly resurgence. Liam was one of those rare cases. The vaccine — given over three doses to babies — is about 95 per cent effective at preventing infections. Although he was fully vaccinated as part of routine childhood immunizations, Liam fell into that small group for whom the vaccine isn't fully protective. Little Liam Dahlberg, eight, from Indiana , complained of a headache after coming home from school last month — the next day he was dead Infectious disease doctors told Ashlee they believed that her son caught Hib from the cough or sneeze of an unvaccinated child. 'Being vaccinated limits your chances of contracting the disease and at the same time limits the carriage of the disease,' she said. 'So, basically in order to not see this disease to this extent, everyone should be vaccinated for it because then it would be eradicated. 'It's not impossible for a vaccinated child to be carrying the bacteria but a vaccinated child would not spread the disease to this extent of being fatal unless an unvaccinated child contracted the disease. 'This is why you don't see it very often because there are more vaccinated children than unvaccinated - but it's the unvaccinated that essentially destroying herd immunity.' The exact source of Liam's infection will never be known for certain but doctors said the timeline suggested exposure happened between April 22 and April 24. Now the family is sharing his devastating case in the hope of raising awareness about Hib - and the importance of maintaining high levels of childhood vaccination rates. 'They don't just protect you they protect others who may not be able to be vaccinated and who may have weakened immune systems,' Ashlee said. He was diagnosed with haemophilus influenzae, also known as H. flu , which had spread to his brain and spinal cord The family is still unsure how Liam caught the infection — he had been fully vaccinated against H.flu as part of his routine childhood schedule Pediatricians have warned of declining vaccine uptake overall in the years since the Covid-19 pandemic, though there is no detailed data as to the fall in rates for children when it comes to H. flu. Misinformation and political polarization are thought to be playing a part. But there may be other reasons fewer children received shots this year, Dr Sean O'Leary of the American Academy of Pediatrics said, citing reduced access to services. Many pediatricians offices were understaffed and not holding as many after-hours vaccination clinics as in the past. Also, more Americans were seeking their vaccinations from pharmacies but some drugstores don't vaccinate children, he said. In a GoFundMe page set up to help cover the medical costs that have amounted to $300,000, the Dahlbergs described Liam as 'a bright and smart young boy, full of life and potential. 'His presence brought joy and warmth to everyone he met,' the page adds.