The emerging chikungunya virus (CHIKV), is an arbovirus causing intense outbreaks in North America. The situation in Mexico is alarming, and CHIKV threatens to spread further throughout North America. Clinical and biological features of CHIKF outbreaks in Mexico have not been well described; thus, we conducted a cross sectional study of a CHIKV outbreak in Chiapas, Southern Mexico to further characterize these features. We collected blood samples from patients suspected of having chikungunya fever (CHIKF) who presented to Clinical Hospital ISSSTE Dr. Roberto Nettel in Tapachula, Chiapas, Mexico. In addition to the clinical examination, real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) standardized for the Asian Chikungunya lineage and/or enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay for immunoglobulin M (IgM) were used to confirm CHIKV diagnosis. Of a total of 850 patients who presented with probably CHIKV at Hospital “Dr. Roberto Nettel”, 112 probable CHIKF cases were enrolled in this study from November 2014- June 2015, of which 95 patients (84.8%) were CHIKV positive and 17 were negative (15.2%). Of these 95 CHIKV positive patients, 62 were positive by real-time reverse transcriptase PCR (+qRT-PCR); and 33 were seropositive to +IgM with a negative qRT-PCR. The most frequent symptoms reported were fever (100%), headache (82.3%), polyarthralgia (72.1%), and exanthem (82.3%). Biological abnormalities observed during CHIKV infection were lymphopenia (41.1%), leukopenia (51.6%), elevated transaminases (30.5%-46.3%) and high LDH (46.3%) and CRP (60.0%). Clinical and biological data obtained from this study is providing more useful information for benchmarking purposes with outbreaks from different parts of the world and would be helpful for better patient care and treatment.
Receptors for the immunoglobulin G constant fraction (FcγRs) are widely expressed in cells of the immune system. Complement-independent phagocytosis prompted FcγR research to show that the engagement of IgG immune complexes with FcγRs triggers a variety of cell host immune responses, such as phagocytosis, antibody-dependent cell cytotoxicity, and NETosis, among others. However, variants of these receptors have been implicated in the development of and susceptibility to autoimmune diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus. Currently, the knowledge of FcγR variants is a required field of antibody therapeutics, which includes the engineering of recombinant soluble human Fc gamma receptors, enhancing the inhibitory and blocking the activating FcγRs function, vaccines, and organ transplantation. Importantly, recent interest in FcγRs is the antibody-dependent enhancement (ADE), a mechanism by which the pathogenesis of certain viral infections is enhanced. ADEs may be responsible for the severity of the SARS-CoV-2 infection. Therefore, FcγRs have become a current research topic. Therefore, this review briefly describes some of the historical knowledge about the FcγR type I family in humans, including the structure, affinity, and mechanism of ligand binding, FcγRs in diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), and the potential therapeutic approaches related to these receptors in SLE.