TY - JOUR T1 - No association between human herpesvirus or herpesvirus saimiri and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis JF - ERJ Open Research JO - erjor DO - 10.1183/23120541.00243-2020 VL - 6 IS - 3 SP - 00243-2020 AU - Quentin Le Hingrat AU - Mada Ghanem AU - Aurélie Cazes AU - Benoit Visseaux AU - Gilles Collin AU - Diane Descamps AU - Charlotte Charpentier AU - Bruno Crestani Y1 - 2020/07/01 UR - http://openres.ersjournals.com/content/6/3/00243-2020.abstract N2 - Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a rare, progressive and irreversible lung disease leading to death within 3 to 5 years of diagnosis [1]. The current hypothesis concerning pathophysiology is that chronic alveolar epithelial cell injury leads to an aberrant reparative response resulting in chronic architecture remodelling of the lung. By inducing alveolar cell injury, viral infection or reactivation has been proposed to play a role in the pathogenesis of IPF and could act as a trigger for acute exacerbation [2]. Herpesviruses are particular suspects since a higher prevalence of Epstein–Barr virus (EBV) and human herpesvirus 8 (HHV-8) has been identified in lung samples from IPF patients [2–7]. However, many of these studies were performed in a period where steroids and immunosuppressive drugs were the standard of care for IPF patients. Mouse models have also suggested the involvement of human herpesviruses as an enhancer of the fibrotic response in lung, by inducing pro-fibrotic factors [8]. Herpesvirus saimiri (HVS), a nonpathogenic gamma herpesvirus infecting squirrel monkeys, has been associated with IPF in one study [9]. This finding has not been confirmed yet. The role of torque teno virus (TTV) has been previously suspected in acute exacerbation of IPF [10].There is a high prevalence of human herpesviruses in lung samples of IPF patients but this does not differ from controls, neither regarding prevalence, viral load levels nor co-infection rates. Herpesvirus saimiri DNA is not detected in any lung samples. https://bit.ly/2ZrKiDJ ER -