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Autoreactivity is a normal feature of the immune system which must be able to distinguish self from non-self. However, when this autoreactivity results in pathological tissue damage, autoimmune diseases result. While autoimmune diseases can be associated with autoreactive T cells or autoantibodies, many of the major autoimmune diseases are considered to be T cell mediated. These include rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, psoriasis and type I diabetes. In developing strategies to treat T cell mediated autoimmune disease conditions, one can consider the autoreactive T cells as pathogens. Thus, one can approach therapies for T cell mediated autoimmune disease by using strategies similar to those used to control other pathogens, such as virus or bacteria. These include strategies involving immunization with attenuated or subunit forms of these pathogens. |
