Cell‐Mediated Immunity to Cytomegalovirus in Pregnant Women

Abstract

Employing the techniques of in vitro lymphocyte transformation (LTF) and complement fixation, cell-mediated immunity (CMI) and antibody to cytomegalovirus (CMV) were studied in pregnant and nonpregnant women. The LTF activity was determined by the whole blood microassay using four strains of CMV (AD-169 and its early antigen [EA], Davis, Veca, and Towne strains), and phytohemagglutinin (PHA). Lymphocyte transformation response to specific CMV antigens at 11-30 weeks of gestation and to nonspecific mitogen (PHA) in all pregnant and postpartum women were found to be significantly depressed compared with the nonpregnant women. The lower LTF responses to CMV antigen and PHA were found in specimens taken from pregnant women at 21-30 weeks of gestation. There were no significant differences in the mean complement-fixing (CF) antibody titers and the percentage of E-rosette-forming T lymphocytes between subjects in various stages of pregnancy. In addition, concanavalin A (Con A)-generated suppressor T cell activity was evaluated in pregnant and nonpregnant women. The suppressor effect of Con A-activated lymphocytes in the pregnant women was somewhat higher than in nonpregnant women. These observations suggest that CMV-specific suppression of cellular immunity may play an important role in reactivation of CMV in pregnancy.

Functional impairment of CMV‐reactive cellular immunity during pregnancy

“…It has been proposed that differences exist in the systemic down‐regulation of the immune response in pregnant women depending on the time of gestation [Agatsuma et al, ; Tanaka et al, ; Kumar et al, ]. Whether this is also true for functional CMV‐specific CMI was determined in 14 CMV‐seropositive pregnant women who were tested at each of the three trimesters of pregnancy by IFN‐γ ELISpot.…”

Levels of antibodies against cytomegalovirus and Chlamydophila pneumoniae are increased in early onset pre‐eclampsia

“…Potential mechanisms include direct local effects of infectious agents on endothelium (on vascular smooth muscle cells and/or on macrophages within the atherosclerotic lesion) or amplification of the systemic inflammatory response. CMV has a seroprevalence of 60–85%, can persist in the human body for several years and can cause recurrent infection, particularly in pregnancy 17–19 . Antibodies to Chl.…”

Persistence of naturally acquired cell-mediated immunity to rubella virus during the first trimester of pregnancy

“…A small but significant depression of the L.T. response to PHA was detected, as documented by others (Thong et al 1973;Agastuma et al 1981). But no significant difference between the two groups was found in the median L.T.…”

“…), which has been shown to be a highly sensitive assay of the rubella immune response (Buimovici-Klein et al 1980). The whole blood microtechnique used here has been shown to be just as sensitive as that using purified lymphocytes, to be T-cell specific, and to avoid nonspecific background reactivity caused by the presence of heterologous serum (Pauly and Han 1976;Chiba et al 1978;Agastuma et al 1981). …”