Even the sickest COVID-19 patients produce T cells to fight the virus, a new study reveals.
The research, published in Science Immunology, provides further evidence that any vaccine against the deadly virus will have to bring in T cells to work with the antibodies.
“This is key to understanding how the immune response fights the virus,” Alessandro Sette, a professor at the La Jolla Institute of Immunology, who co-led the study, said in a statement. “He wants the vaccine approaches to be based on observations from quite diverse settings to ensure that the results are generally applicable.”
The researchers tracked 10 COVID-19 patients with very severe symptoms. All were admitted to the ICU and ventilators were placed as part of their care. Two finally died of the disease.
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Upon close examination of their immune responses, it became clear that all 10 patients produced T cells targeting SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. T cells worked hand in hand with antibodies to try to stop infections.
“Activation of these cells appears to be at least as important as the production of antibodies,” said Erasmus MC virologist Rory de Vries, who co-led the study.
As of Friday afternoon, there were more than 2.7 million infections and at least 129,114 deaths in the United States from COVID-19.
