Covid, here is who gets the most seriously ill: autoantibodies under accusation

They are called autoantibodies and neutralize molecules (interferons) that play an essential role in the correct immune response to Covid. People who have them, or who have genetic defects that affect the expression of these allies of our defense, tend to get particularly severe forms of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus disease. To shed light on this mechanism are two works that have appeared today in ‘Science Immunology’ which may also have important repercussions in the clinical management of the disease. Works that report the results of the study of an international consortium of researchers, which also includes an important Italian contribution. The super archive ‘Storm’ of Covid patients, coordinated by the super archive ‘Storm’ of Covid patients, coordinated by the ‘Storm’ University of Milano-Bicocca in synergy with the Asst of Monza. What has emerged is that the prevalence of type I interferons increases beyond the age of 60 and these are the basis of about 20% of all fatal cases of Covid-19. But there is a fact considered crucial by experts: research shows that the presence of autoantibodies precedes the onset of Covid-19. This would allow us to play in advance, with vaccines and early treatments based on the use of monoclonal antibodies. “These results – underline Paolo Bonfanti, professor of infectious diseases of Milano-Bicocca, and Andrea Biondi, professor of Pediatrics at the same university – could have very important therapeutic implications: first of all, the search for antibodies to interferon could become a screening test given the fair frequency of these autoantibodies in the general population with advancing age “.” Secondly, patients with autoantibodies against it. type I interferon – Bonfanti and Biondi continue – should be vaccinated against Covid as a matter of priority. And finally, in case of Sars-CoV-2 infection, people not yet vaccinated in which the presence of these autoantibodies was detected, should be hospitalized in hospital for proper clinical management Early treatment with monoclonal antibodies could be administered layer in these patients before symptoms of Covid pneumonia appear “. The Storm project (observational study on the natural history of patients hospitalized for Sars-Cov-2) that contributed to the two published works is an electronic archive of clinical, diagnostic and treatments relating to Covid patients admitted to the San Gerardo hospital in Monza. It is coordinated by Bonfanti and implemented by the Bicocca Clinical Research Office (BiCRO). For the research published in ‘Science Immunology’, in particular, the contribution of the collection of residual biological material deriving from swabs and patient samples, coordinated on the initiative of Biondi, was fundamental. These studies, Bonfanti and Biondi explain, “are the continuation of an international research project begun in the first months of the pandemic, aimed at studying the underlying causes of the extreme multiformity of the disease, which can manifest itself with a spectrum that varies from asymptomatic infection to rapid death. For some time, research has focused on the genetic causes of this diversity and in particular on the role of some proteins produced by the cells of the immune system, such as interferons, which condition the favorable response to Covid-19 “.