Abstract
The enduring view of eosinophils, as immune effector cells whose primary function is host defence against infection by helminths and other microbial pathogens, sets the stage for a fundamental question regarding the safety of therapeutic eosinophil depletion. If eosinophils are significantly reduced or altogether depleted in an effort to alleviate the negative effects of tissue eosinophilia and eosinophilic inflammation in conditions such as asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, chronic rhinosinusitis with nasal polyps, eosinophilic granulomatosis with polyangiitis and hypereosinophilic syndrome, would these patients become susceptible to infection or another illness? Development of mouse models in whom the eosinophil lineage has been ablated, observations in patients naturally lacking eosinophils and data from studies of eosinophil-depleting medical therapies indicate that the absence of eosinophils is not detrimental to health. The evidence available to date, as presented in this review, supports the conclusion that even if certain homeostatic roles for the eosinophil may be demonstrable in controlled animal models and humanin vitrosettings, the evolution of the human species appears to have provided sufficient immune redundancy such that one may be hale and hearty without eosinophils.
Footnotes
This manuscript has recently been accepted for publication in theEuropean Respiratory Journal. It is published here in its accepted form prior to copyediting and typesetting by our production team. After these production processes are complete and the authors have approved the resulting proofs, the article will move to the latest issue of the收获online. Please open or download the PDF to view this article.
Conflict of interest: Professor David J. Jackson reports receiving advisory board and speaker fees from AstraZeneca, Sanofi, Novartis, Chiesi Pharmaceuticals, Boehringer Ingelheim, and GlaxoSmithKline (GSK).
Conflict of interest: Professor Ian D. Pavord has no disclosures to report.
- ReceivedJune 16, 2022.
- AcceptedJuly 25, 2022.
- Copyright ©The authors 2022. For reproduction rights and permissions contactpermissions{at}ersnet.org