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It's interesting that you and van den Bossche both discuss antibodies of the innate immune system. Antibodies have previously, and for duration of my medical education & practice, been understood to be exclusive to humoral immunity, which falls under the adaptive immune system. In van den Bossche's case, I assumed this was a mistake due to English being a foreign language for him. But you seem to be a native English speaker. So is "antibody" acquiring a new expanded meaning?

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Yes, my study and in conjunction with Geert, does distinguish innate antibodies from acquired antibodies. lagging 10 years behind. The conservative and dogmatic mentality explains why innate Ab-secreting B cells and NK cells are still poorly studied as effector lymphocytes of the innate immune system. Only few scientists seem to understand the immunology of cells that recognize molecular pathogen-associated patterns rather than specific antigens. We are arguing that it is not the acquired but innate immune system is relevant to enveloped glycosylated viruses that spread extracellularly. This is because innate Abs and NK cells recognize self-mimicking components (e.g., N-terminal glycans) that are shared amongst those viruses (e.g., Flu, RSV, CoVs). '

The immune preparedness of children as an example, to any novel pathogens, including, SARS-CoV-2 might be based on several factors. First, in the early phases of infection, natural antibodies (innate) play a most important role. These are secreted by B 1 cells, distinct from B cell of acquired. Natural antibodies, mostly of IgM isotype and generated independently of previous antigen encounters, have a broad reactivity and a variable affinity. They contain, tamp down, the infection during the 2 weeks necessary for production of high-affinity antibodies (acquired) 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. This is referenced from here:

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

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It is impossible that Geert does not know the meaning of those words in English, even though it is not his mother tongue.

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