High Pulmonary Levels of IL-6 and IL-1ß in Children with Chronic Suppurative Lung Disease Are Associated with Low Systemic IFN-? Production in Response to Non-Typeable Haemophilus influenzae

Pizzutto, Susan J.; Upham, John W.; Yerkovich, Stephanie T.; Chang, Anne B.

There is a growing body of evidence that persistent airway or systemic inflammation may contribute to impaired T-cell responses. Severe acute inflammation and chronic infection can disrupt macrophage and T-cell activation and subsequently induce an environment of immune tolerance or exhaustion [9, 10] . Furthermore, it is increasingly recognised that lung and systemic immune responses may be inter-related [11, 12] . Given these associations, in this prospective study involving 70 young children with CSLD/bronchiectasis, we investigated whether inflammation (local and systemic) is related to the capacity to produce IFN-γ in response to NTHi. We hypothesised that an impaired systemic ability to produce IFN-γ in response to NTHi is associated with lung or systemic inflammation. The most notable finding from this study was that NTHi-specific IFN-γ production by blood mononuclear cells was associated with inflammation.