%0 Journal Article %A Claudia Gomes %A Marisol Zuniga %A Kelly A Crotty %A Kun Qian %A Nubia Catalina Tovar %A Lawrence Hsu Lin %A Kimon V Argyropoulos %A Robert Clancy %A Peter Izmirly %A Jill Buyon %A David C Lee %A Maria Fernanda Yasnot-Acosta %A Huilin Li %A Paolo Cotzia %A Ana Rodriguez %T Autoimmune anti-DNA and anti-phosphatidylserine antibodies predict development of severe COVID-19 %D 2021 %R 10.26508/lsa.202101180 %J Life Science Alliance %P e202101180 %V 4 %N 11 %X High levels of autoimmune antibodies are observed in COVID-19 patients but their specific contribution to disease severity and clinical manifestations remains poorly understood. We performed a retrospective study of 115 COVID-19 hospitalized patients with different degrees of severity to analyze the generation of autoimmune antibodies to common antigens: a lysate of erythrocytes, the lipid phosphatidylserine (PS) and DNA. High levels of IgG autoantibodies against erythrocyte lysates were observed in a large percentage (up to 36%) of patients. Anti-DNA and anti-PS antibodies determined upon hospital admission correlated strongly with later development of severe disease, showing a positive predictive value of 85.7% and 92.8%, respectively. Patients with positive values for at least one of the two autoantibodies accounted for 24% of total severe cases. Statistical analysis identified strong correlations between anti-DNA antibodies and markers of cell injury, coagulation, neutrophil levels and erythrocyte size. Anti-DNA and anti-PS autoantibodies may play an important role in the pathogenesis of COVID-19 and could be developed as predictive biomarkers for disease severity and specific clinical manifestations. %U https://www.life-science-alliance.org/content/lsa/4/11/e202101180.full.pdf