Severe acute hepatitis in children: investigate SARS-CoV-2 superantigens | Hacker News Reader

Severe acute hepatitis in children: investigate SARS-CoV-2 superantigens

thelancet.com

25 pointslnyan11 comments

At an overall C19 prevalence of ~33% in the UK, it is not surprising, that 10-20% of children who there are among the hepatitis cases tested positive for SARS-Cov-2. Wondering why they take this into account at all for their explanation tries, for the UK. Still the Israeli cases might point stronger in that direction with 11/12 cases showing C19 has been there.

Checking might so still be a good idea.

SARS-CoV-2 vaccination can elicit a CD8 T-cell dominant hepatitis: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhep.2022.03.040

I don’t necessarily feel qualified to assess the quality of the linked paper but it seems relevant. Anyone have any thoughts?

The paper is not a study in itself, it is a specific medical case that was chosen due to the possible link between the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine and the acute hepatitis this person developed.

The hepatologists found SARS-CoV-2 specific T cells (determined via ELISA) in the liver of a 52-year-old male which had caused an autoimmune reaction in which the patient developed acute hepatitis. It was ruled out to be any of the known hepatitis viruses through serology and PCR testing.

The link between SARS2 and the hepatitis came from the high amount of SARS2 specific CD8 T-cells. However, they also found Epstein-Barr virus specific T-cells in the same areas, although the SARS2 specific T-cells were activated cytotoxic with a high correlation to the concentration of hepatitis.

I'd say that shows a strong correlation and it is possible this individual developed hepatitis from the Pfizer vaccine (BNT162b2 mRNA). There is nothing that suggest that this is in any way or form an expected side-effect from the vaccine itself.

Edit: Note that autoimmune diseases can come from almost anything. There will be a very few cases where the immune reaction to the vaccine itself will cause an autoimmune disease. However, most of the children that have developed hepatitis are under the age of 5 and therefore not eligible to receive the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine in the countries where the reports are from.

However, a lot of the children with hepatitis have had an SARS-CoV-2 infection, which is why that link is currently being investigated by hepatologists.

Article says cause might be viral proteins in the epithelial layer of intestines, and then assumes those proteins are present due to infection, leaving out the possibility viral proteins are finding their way into youch children's intestines through other means... Such as vaccinated breastfeeding women.

> leaving out the possibility viral proteins are finding their way into youch children's intestines through other means... Such as vaccinated breastfeeding women.

I struggle to find where it suggests that vaccinated breastfeeding women have somehow contaminated toddlers?

On contrary, it seems to me that it implies a secondary infection with an adenovirus to be the cause:

(citation)

"Following infection with SARS-CoV-2 virus, viral reservoirs have been reported and could over time lead to repeated super-antigen mediated immune cell activation as shown in Multisystem infammatory syndrome, MIS-C.

If such viral reservoirs are present and a child is subsequently infected with AdV, this superantigen-mediated effect could be much more pronounced and potentially give rise to immunopatthology."

And at the moment it's just an hypothesis.

An easy way to exclude this hypothesis would be to check the ages. You’d see some kind of hard drop past ~1.5 years. Skimming source 2, it seems like they’re talking about a much wider range of ages, but still it’s be worth breaking down the data in detail.

Not a doctor, have three questions:

Is what you describe a common issue with other vaccines?

Is this way of "infection" really harmful?

If yes, would the effect of a real COVID infection via breastfeeding be less or more dangerous

The MRNA jabs by definition induce the recipients body to produce viral proteins, so no, other vaccines would NOT cause similar issues. It's not infection per-se, but could explain unprecedented and novel downstream effects. Breastfeeding during an active COVID infection could cause similar results, though infants and young children lack the ACE-2 receptors the virus most actively infects

Article specifically says that "SARS-CoV-2 infection can result in viral reservoir formation" and that this may lead to repeated release of virus to body. This may cause the rise of immune activation and "SARS-CoV-2 spike protein that bears resemblance to Staphylococcal enterotoxin B, triggering broad and non-specific T-cell activation. This superantigen-mediated immune-cell activation has been proposed as a causal mechanism of multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children".

As MRNA vaccine do not make recipient body to create replicable viral protein, I fail to see the mechanism that would create this viral reservoir and article does not even mention this as possibility. Moreover, MRNA vaccine itself is not injected into your blood, but to muscle tissue, so how would that MRNA vaccine get into milk? Especially if you compare it with much much higher probability of child simply being infected with live virus.

Please can you explain how a weakened virus, infecting but not overwhelming an immune system, or an adenovirus modified to produce such proteins, or direct injection of these proteins differ from mRNA vaccines in their ability to leave proteins in a person?

I don't understand if you're distinguishing non-COVID vaccines or non-mRNA vaccines when you say other vaccines won't have the issue.

The amount of spike protein that manages to circulate the blood stream is super low, like orders of magnitude lower than in a typical live infection.

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