Cytokine profile and anti-inflammatory activity of COVID-19 convalescent plasma in vitro

Maksimovich A.V., Potapnev M.P., Dunayev I.A., Gushina L.M., Karpenko F.N.

Republican Scientific and Practical Center for Transfusiology and Medical Biotechnologies, Minsk, Belarus

A comparative study of the cytokine profile of COVID-19 convalescent plasma (CCP) and control plasma of healthy individuals (control plasma) with comparable antibody titers against SARS-CoV-2 was conducted. It was shown that CCP in contrast to the control plasma has significantly higher level of IFN-γ and slightly lower level of chemokine IP-10. Anti-inflammatory activity of CCP did not differ significantly from that of control plasma of healthy individuals and possessed a weak direct correlation with the level of IL-8, and inverse – with the level of TGF-β. An imbalance of cytokines in CCP versus control plasma was discovered and was characterized by a reduced level of IL-6 in comparison to IFN-γ and IL-8, IFN-γ – in comparison to MCP-1; and a significant excess of TGF-β over IFN-γ, IL-8 and IP-10.

It was concluded that the imbalance of cytokines detected in COVID-19 convalescent plasma (CCP) compared to the control plasma of healthy individuals may be one of the factors of immunomodulatory activity of CCP during clinical application.