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Comment
. 2023 Nov;11(11):e1056.
doi: 10.1002/iid3.1056.

High frequency of type I interferon auto-antibodies in a group of middle-aged HIV-infected patients: A cross-sectional exploratory study

Luisa Imberti  1 , Paola Magro  2 , Alessandra Sottini  3 , Virginia Quaresima  3 , Francesco Castelli  2 , Eugenia Quiros-Roldan  2
Affiliations
Comment

High frequency of type I interferon auto-antibodies in a group of middle-aged HIV-infected patients: A cross-sectional exploratory study

Luisa Imberti et al. Immun Inflamm Dis. 2023 Nov.

Abstract

Background: Auto-antibodies neutralizing the activity of type I interferons have been recently described in patients infected by SARS-CoV-2. They can be present even before the onset of the infection. Since type I interferons exert a dichotomous role in the pathogenesis of acute versus chronic HIV infection and auto-antibodies are often found in untreated and anti-retroviral treated HIV+ patients, we investigated whether auto-antibodies anti-type I interferons are present at high prevalence in those HIV+ patients with concomitant opportunistic infections (OIs).

Methods: The analysis of auto-antibodies against two types of type I interferons (IFN-α2 and IFN-ω) was performed using the ELISA test in 60 patients chronically infected by HIV who showed concomitant infections caused by mycobacterium tuberculosis or nontuberculosis mycobacterium or with active cytomegalovirus infections. Results were compared with those of 283 SARS-CoV-2 swab positive patients showing mild to severe pneumonia. A chi-square (χ2 ) test or the Wilcoxon-Mann-Whitney test were used to compare the HIV+ patient categorical or continuous variables, respectively.

Results: A high prevalence of auto-antibodies to type I interferons was found in middle-aged HIV-infected patients with concomitant OIs (11.6% vs. 5.3% in COVID-19 subjects; p < .05). No statistically differences were found for viro/immunological characteristics (CD4 and CD8 cell counts and viral load) between patients with and without type I interferons auto-antibodies.

Conclusions: This study, which is the first searching auto-antibodies against type I interferons in HIV-infected patients, demonstrated that their prevalence was higher than that expected by the age of these patients. Furthermore, it indicated that these auto-antibodies are nonspecifically increased in critical SARS-CoV-2 infection but can be found also in other infections.

Keywords: HIV infection; Type I interferons; auto-antibodies; opportunistic infections.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Comment on

  • Autoantibodies neutralizing type I IFNs are present in ~4% of uninfected individuals over 70 years old and account for ~20% of COVID-19 deaths.
    Bastard P, Gervais A, Le Voyer T, Rosain J, Philippot Q, Manry J, Michailidis E, Hoffmann HH, Eto S, Garcia-Prat M, Bizien L, Parra-Martínez A, Yang R, Haljasmägi L, Migaud M, Särekannu K, Maslovskaja J, de Prost N, Tandjaoui-Lambiotte Y, Luyt CE, Amador-Borrero B, Gaudet A, Poissy J, Morel P, Richard P, Cognasse F, Troya J, Trouillet-Assant S, Belot A, Saker K, Garçon P, Rivière JG, Lagier JC, Gentile S, Rosen LB, Shaw E, Morio T, Tanaka J, Dalmau D, Tharaux PL, Sene D, Stepanian A, Megarbane B, Triantafyllia V, Fekkar A, Heath JR, Franco JL, Anaya JM, Solé-Violán J, Imberti L, Biondi A, Bonfanti P, Castagnoli R, Delmonte OM, Zhang Y, Snow AL, Holland SM, Biggs C, Moncada-Vélez M, Arias AA, Lorenzo L, Boucherit S, Coulibaly B, Anglicheau D, Planas AM, Haerynck F, Duvlis S, Nussbaum RL, Ozcelik T, Keles S, Bousfiha AA, El Bakkouri J, Ramirez-Santana C, Paul S, Pan-Hammarström Q, Hammarström L, Dupont A, Kurolap A, Metz CN, Aiuti A, Casari G, Lampasona V, Ciceri F, Barreiros LA, Dominguez-Garrido E, Vidigal M, Zatz M, van de Beek D, Sahanic S, Tancevski I, Stepanovskyy Y, Boyarchuk O, Nukui Y, Tsumura M, Vidaur L, Tangye SG, Burrel S, Duffy D, Quintana-Murci L, Klocperk A, Kann NY,… See abstract for full author list ➔ Bastard P, et al. Sci Immunol. 2021 Aug 19;6(62):eabl4340. doi: 10.1126/sciimmunol.abl4340. Sci Immunol. 2021. PMID: 34413139 Free PMC article.

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