Correlation Analysis Between Disease Severity and Inflammation-related Parameters in Patients with COVID-19 Pneumonia

Jing Gong; Hui Dong; Song Qing Xia; Yi Zhao Huang; Dingkun Wang; Yan Zhao; Wenhua Liu; Shenghao Tu; Mingmin Zhang; Qi Wang; Fuer Lu

Preventing recognition or blocking the occurrence of inflammatory action, new drugs development on immune regulation, might be new breakthroughs in the control of COVID-19 pneumonia. Pathological examination found lymphocyte-dominated mononuclear cell infiltration in interstitial pulmonary tissue, CD4+ and CD8+ T cells were significantly reduced in peripheral blood cells, but a high ratio of CD38+ (CD4 3.47%) and HLA-DR+ (CD8 39.4%) T cells [9] , which suggested excessive activation of pro-inflammatory cells. Presumably, lymphocyte deposition in lung tissue might contribute to lymphocyte reduction in peripheral blood. In addition, researchers found that CCR4+ CCR6+ Th17 cells were increased, and the IL-17 inhibitor (Secukinumab) against activated Th17 cells is promising for disease control [9] . In this study, IL-6, TNFα and IL-8 may be potential targets for immunotherapy of COVID-19. With IL-6 >100pg/mL, the patient's condition was extremely critical. According to the news, a research team from First Affiliated Hospital of University of Science and Technology of China has used IL-6 receptor recombinant monoclonal antibody, Tozhu monoclonal antibody, in 14 critically or severely ill COVID-19 patients [10] .