Effects of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) coronavirus infection on peripheral blood lymphocytes and their subsets

Lymphopenia is a prominent part of SARS-CoV infection and lymphocyte counts may be useful in predicting the severity and clinical outcomes. Possible reasons for the SARS-associated lymphopenia may be direct infection of lymphocytes by SARS-CoV, lymphocyte sequestration in the lung or cytokine-mediated lymphocyte trafficking. There may also be immune-mediated lymphocyte destruction, bone marrow or thymus suppression, or apoptosis.