INNATE immunity in children; Carsetti et al. describes the potency of the innate immune response in children and particularly its antibodies; I also provide a library of references for your reading

by Paul Alexander

January 28, 2022

The pediatric/child immune system (innate immunity) is very prepared & fit to react to novelty, a function that might be diminished in adults & ineffective in elderly persons aged 70 years or older.

So moving from infancy to young children to young persons, as aging occurs, the capacity to react to novel pathogen immunologically, shifts to immunological memory (adaptive-acquired long-lived immunity) and this ‘novelty’ capacity is often non-existent in older persons. It is critical for the innate first-line of defense to play the role of taking the edge off or blunting the initial attack so that the secondary acquired adaptive immunity can ‘mop’ up, and ‘not’ be overwhelmed. This is a simplistic description but I felt I would put it out there.

I thus wanted to deal with the innate immunity of children for the innate immunity is often disregarded and misunderstood. I argue that it is the innate immunity (innate antibodies and innate NK cells) that is key to emerging from a pandemic. Particularly this one. We may have already done tremendous damage.

This paper by Carsetti et al. (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC7202830/) confirms what we have been talking about in terms of innate immunity (comprised of innate antibodies and natural killer cells (NK cells) and other immune components) and it is as potent or even more so than natural immunity. I argue that just maybe, innate is really the star of the immune system. In other words, if innate does not do its thing in the initial prevention of infection or killing of infected cells, then the natural immune response may be sub-optimal. The natural innate immunity has to tamp down or do a huge lift by the time it is breached (if indeed it is breached), such that the acquired-adaptive natural immunity (akin to the 2nd level of defense if the innate is breached) will have less severe infection (load) to deal with. The two compartments go hand in hand but innate may be even more pivotal, yet not fully recognized. I am sure you do not hear much of it or did not know of its role as the first line of defense.

Today, many scientists and doctors do not know of the existence of the innate immune system and particularly innate antibodies. Or they do not know the extent of its potent role. Innate antibodies confer more immediate, early, and broad protection against pathogens, making them a crucial non-redundant component of the immune system. These antibodies are produced by B-1 cells.

We/I have been sharing that we are at risk of devastating consequences if we vaccinate our children with COVID vaccines. Vaccinal antibodies may damage the innate immune system and particularly the innate antibodies, and especially in children. Vaccinal antibodies may suppress the innate antibodies and subvert them, outcompeting the innate antibodies for the antigen. This will leave children at risk to a range of pathogen that the innate antibodies (innate immune system) usually help protect against. This is dangerous if we continue this vaccine roll-out. It has to be stopped, and definitely no vaccine for children. The effect of vaccinal antibodies on innate antibodies was not studied by vaccine makers Pfizer etc. The FDA has failed in not mandating these studies.

One can even argue that the natural immunity ‘depends’ on the initial innate response. Innate’s role is much more critical than you realize. Because of the ‘first line of defense’ innate immunity, children are not at serious risk of infection or illness from COVID, no matter what variant. Reports are that no healthy child has died of COVID in the US. Neither in large nations like Germany and Sweden. The global data has been stable and clear for 20 months now how low the risk is for children. It has never changed.

The CDC, NIH, Fauci, Hotez, Walensky, Francis Collins and the media engage in fear porn, are wrong most of the time, illogical at best, and not contemporary with the data and science. Your healthy child will be ok if exposed to COVID e.g. omicron. We have no data to show us otherwise. The data tells us this, and mass vaccinating healthy children with these COVID vaccines when it is not needed, and when they have such low risk, and when the vaccines have been shown to be unsafe in adults and teens, is criminal. The good news is children will develop natural immunity if exposed naturally and harmlessly, and I and others have argued children are likely 80-90% already cross-protected/immune from prior common cold coronaviruses. Moreover, their robust potent innate immune system protects them from a broad array of pathogen. They come with the innate system and are ready for COVID.

How would children ‘come’ with this innate immunity? What is the mechanism? The magic is that maternal antibodies provide protection to children during the first months of life and is based on her prior exposures. Children are what we can call ‘antigen naïve’ or ‘antigen inexperienced’. It is the exposures after the first months of life (after the primary or first exposure) that enable children to build the long-lived memory B and T cells that would work to prevent reinfection or more serious disease after exposure. While the young child and persons immune response can react so very nimbly and broadly and effectively, this capacity declines as persons gets older (age), declining significantly by the time persons are >70 years of age. So the innate ‘pre-activated’ response is most potent and protective in childhood and the acquired response (with memory) more potent with age, and this is understood.

The powerful innate immune system of children is serviced by antibodies and NK cells as well as several other cellular components. The innate antibodies (low-affinity and non-specific with some variability) are mainly the IgM type and are broadly reactive. This is what gives the innate such elegance, versality, and potency. The innate antibodies have very broad coverage to a vast array of pathogen. One can argue that their job is to manage and tamp down the infection during the initial 2 weeks or so, which gives time for the high-affinity, antigen-specific acquired/adaptive antibodies and MBCs to be produced that will serve to clear out the virus and prevent reinfection from occurring.

What does the Carsetti et al. study add?

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC7202830/

Evolution has endowed a survival advantage to children to combat known and unknown pathogens. The adult is also well protected by the balance of cells with high and low specificity. With ageing, malnutrition, immunosuppression, and co-morbid states, our immune system loses the ability to adapt to novelty.

A bit more detail from the study:

“The immune preparedness of children to any novel pathogens, including, SARS-CoV-2 might be based on several factors. First, in the early phases of infection, natural antibodies play a most important role. Natural antibodies, mostly of IgM isotype and generated independently of previous antigen encounters, have a broad reactivity and a variable affinity. They contain the infection during the 2 weeks necessary for production of high-affinity antibodies and MBCs that will clear the virus and prevent reinfection. High-affinity antibodies are expressed by switched MBCs. In humans, natural antibodies are produced by innate or IgM MBCs, a population of MBCs that is generated independently of the germinal centres and is most abundant in children. From this population of B cells, sorted from the blood of young adults never exposed to avian influenza virus, we have cloned human antibodies able to neutralize antigenically diverse H1, H2, H5, H6, H8, and H9 influenza subtypes. Thus, innate or IgM MBCs can bind many different unknown microorganisms.”

Library of studies that may be of interest, informing about the innate immune system: