Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Endocrinology, Hannover Medical School, Hannover, Germany.
Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Essen University Hospital, University of Duisburg-Essen, Essen, Germany.
Front Immunol. 2020 Oct 8;11:571166. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2020.571166. eCollection 2020.
Chronic viral infections cause deterioration of our immune system. However, since persistent infections rarely can be eliminated, the reinvigoration capacity of an exhausted immune system has remained largely elusive. Chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection can since some years be effectively cured with novel direct acting antiviral agents. Thus, it is now possible to study reversal of immunity in patients that are cured from a long-lasting chronic infection. We here highlight recent developments in the analysis of various immune cell populations during and after clearance of HCV infection. Surprisingly, whereas reinvigoration of certain immune traits clearly can be seen, many features of immune exhaustion persist over time after viral elimination. Thus, a long-term chronic insult might result in irreversible damage to our immune system. This will be important to consider in therapeutic vaccination efforts against chronic infection and in the development of immunotherapy based strategies against cancer.
慢性病毒感染会导致我们的免疫系统恶化。然而，由于持续性感染很少能被清除，因此，耗尽的免疫系统的恢复能力在很大程度上仍然难以捉摸。新型直接作用抗病毒药物已可有效治愈慢性丙型肝炎病毒（HCV）感染。因此，现在可以研究从长期慢性感染中治愈的患者的免疫逆转。我们在此强调了在 HCV 感染清除过程中和清除后分析各种免疫细胞群的最新进展。令人惊讶的是，尽管某些免疫特征的恢复活力显而易见，但在病毒清除后很长一段时间内，免疫衰竭的许多特征仍然存在。因此，长期的慢性损伤可能会对我们的免疫系统造成不可逆转的损害。这对于针对慢性感染的治疗性疫苗接种工作以及针对癌症的免疫治疗策略的发展都很重要。
