Volume 6 Issue 8, Aug 2021:
Article
Differential immune responses in pregnant patients recovered from COVID-19
Ge Chen,Yiming Zhang
ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-5099-3894,Yaoyao Zhang,Jihui Ai,Bin Yang,Mengge Cui,Qiuyue Liao,Hanxiao Chen,Hualin Bai,Dashing Shang,Jing Chen,ChaoYang Sun
ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-2469-1638,Haiyi Liu,Fengyuan Liu,Bin Mao,Guoqiang Sun,Lu Chen
ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-1083-9729,Jing-wen Lin &…Kezhen Li
ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-7943-5389
Pregnant women are generally more susceptible to viral infection. Although the impact of SARS-CoV-2 in pregnancy remains to be determined, evidence indicates that the risk factors for severe COVID-19 are similar in pregnancy to the general population. Here we systemically analyzed the clinical characteristics of pregnant and non-pregnant female COVID-19 patients who were hospitalized during the same period and found that pregnant patients developed marked lymphopenia and higher inflammation evident by higher C-reactive protein and IL-6. To elucidate the pathways that might contribute to immunopathology or protective immunity against COVID-19 during pregnancy, we applied single-cell mRNA sequencing to profile peripheral blood mononuclear cells from four pregnant and six non-pregnant female patients after recovery along with four pregnant and three non-pregnant healthy donors. We found normal clonal expansion of T cells in the pregnant patients, heightened activation and chemotaxis in NK, NKT, and MAIT cells, and differential interferon responses in the monocyte compartment. Our data present a unique feature in both innate and adaptive immune responses in pregnant patients recovered from COVID-19.
