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"The team hypothesised that some of the T cells specific to SARS-CoV-2 had been activated by a herpesvirus called human #cytomegalovirus (HCMV). This pathogen is highly prevalent in the population and has also been linked to changes in the severity of #COVID19 symptoms (Alanio et al., 2022). To investigate, they stimulated pre-pandemic blood samples with different segments of SARS-CoV-2 proteins. This led them to discover a population of ‘cross-reactive’ CD4 and CD8 T cells that can recognize epitopes from both #SARSCoV2 and #HCMV"
@cyrilpedia @hannu_ikonen I know it affects T cells, but can you explain this more simply for us non microbiologist or virologist peeps?