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Severely inflames organs and tissues such as the heart, lungs, kidneys, digestive system, brain, skin, or eyes
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Most children with this syndrome are between 3 and 12 years old, and the most affected have an average age of 8 years
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A team of researchers from Mount Sinai Hospital in New York (USA) has found an important clue about the origin of the multisystemic inflammatory syndrome or MIS-C (for its acronym in English), a rare consequence associated with the coronavirus that affects some children and can lead to death.
Most minors infected with SARS-CoV-2 have a mild illness but some develop MIS-C, a condition that severely inflames organs and tissues such as the heart, lungs, kidneys, digestive system, brain, skin, or eyes.
MIS-C is considered a syndrome (a set of signs and symptoms), not a disease, because there are many issues that are still unknown as the cause or risk factors.
Most children with this syndrome are between 3 and 12 years old, and the most affected have an average age of 8 years.
Only in United States, Since the pandemic began, 2,600 cases have been reported.
Now, researchers at the hospital in New York have discovered that certain cells of the immune system The infection-fighting agents are poorly activated in children with MIS-C, and this is associated with a sustained inflammatory response, a hallmark of SARS-CoV-2.
The study, which is published this Wednesday in the journal Nature Communications, was done by sequencing the RNA from blood samples from the Mount Sinai Covid-19 Biobank.
Thanks to an extensive study of gene expression, researchers have taken an important step by providing new avenues of exploration involving complex networks and gene subnets analyzed in pediatric cases of MIS-C and covid-19 from the Biobank.
One of the most significant of these gene networks involved the deletion of two types of immune cells: natural killer (NK) cells and CD8 + T cells.
Previous research had shown that when CD8 + T cells persistently fight to pathogens, they enter a state of “exhaustion” and lose efficacy and proliferation capacity.
The new study specifically notes that in cases of MIS-C, CD8 + T cells are in this depleted state, which could weaken the inflammatory immune response.
What’s more, the study also reveals that the increase in NK cells it is associated with depleted CD8 + T cells.
“Our study has found that T-cell depletion in SMI-C patients is one of the possible factors driving this disease, suggesting that an increase in both circulating NK cells and depleted CD8 + T cells could improve the symptoms of inflammatory disease “, explains Noam Beckmann, professor in the Faculty of Mount Sinai Icahn Medicine.
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The study also has found nine key regulators of this gene network and they point out that one of them, TBX21, is a promising therapeutic target.
The covid-19 Biobank of hospital Mount Sinai is an initiative created by a team of volunteers made up of more than 100 nurses, doctors and researchers, which serves as the basis for all the research on covid-19 that is being developed in the medical center.
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