Early stimulated immune responses predict clinical disease severity in hospitalized COVID-19 patients

The manifestation of COVID-19 varies from asymptomatic to severe pneumonia requiring ventilator support or multi-organ failure. It is still poorly understood how the immune response to SARS-CoV-2 affects the development of severe disease. There is also a lack of clinical tools to identify patients early with high risk of poor outcome. Here, we looked for potential markers of disease severity in hospitalized COVID-19 patients using method to measure individual immune reactions. We found associations between impaired immune response pathways at time of hospitalization and development of severe and critical COVID-19 disease, and we identified a number of immune markers that could be used to predict poor outcome. Our findings could help identify at-risk patients upon hospitalization, enabling closer monitoring and earlier interventions.