Like other factors such as age, sex and genetics, smoking has a major impact on immune responses. This is the finding recently made by a team of scientists at the Institut Pasteur using the Milieu Intérieur cohort of 1,000 healthy volunteers, established to understand variability in immune responses. In addition to its short-term impact on immunity, smoking also has long-term consequences.
Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the range of clinical outcomes for individuals infected with SARS-CoV-2 varied widely, from showing no symptoms to succumbing to the disease. A research team from the Institut Pasteur, the CNRS, and the Collège de France collaborated with international scientists to
SARS-CoV-2: How the history of human populations influences their immune response phys.org - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from phys.org Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the clinical spectrum observed among people infected with SARS-CoV-2 ranged from asymptomatic carriage to death. Researchers at the Institut Pasteur, the CNRS and the Collège de France, in collaboration with researchers around the world , have investigated the extent and drivers of differences in immune responses to SARS-CoV-2 across populations from Central Africa, Western Europe and East Asia. They show that latent cytomegalovirus infection and human genetic factors, driven by natural selection, contribute to population differences in immune response to SARS-CoV-2 and the severity of COVID-19. Understanding the factors underlying such population disparities could help to improve patient management in future epidemics. These results were published on August 9, 2023 in Nature.