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Clin. Vaccine Immunol. doi:10.1128/CVI.00035-08
Copyright (c) 2008, American Society for Microbiology and/or the Listed Authors/Institutions. All Rights Reserved.

Hantavirus infection induces higher plasma levels of IL-9, FGF-2 and GM-CSF, and lower levels of IL-8 and IP-10, in females compared to males

Department of Clinical Microbiology, Division of Infectious Diseases, Umeå University, SE-901 85 Umeå, Sweden; Department of Microbiology, Tumor and Cell Biology, Karolinska Institutet, SE-171 77 Stockholm, Sweden; Swedish Institute for Infectious Disease Control, SE-171 82 Solna, Sweden

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. Email: Jonas.Klingstrom{at}smi.ki.se.

	Abstract

There are often sex differences in susceptibility for infectious diseases and in level of mortality after infection. These differences probably stem from sex-related abilities to mount proper or unwanted immune responses against an infectious agent. We report that hantavirus-infected female patients show significantly higher plasma levels of IL-9, FGF-2 and GM-CSF, and lower levels of IL-8 and IP-10, than male patients. The results demonstrate that a virus infection can induce sex dependent differences in acute immune responses in humans. This finding may, at least partly, explain the observed sex differences in susceptibility for infectious diseases and in mortality following infection.