Abstract

Cytokine Release Syndrome (Cytokine storm) which is an autoimmune reaction or an autoimmune-like reaction accounts for the complications of COVID-19 and finding immunotherapeutic drugs capable of blocking the cytokine storm would prevent the morbidity and mortality of COVID-19. Certain groups of people are recognized to be more vulnerable to the complications of this infection than others. The Cytokine Release Syndrome (CRS) leads to several neurological conditions even meriting COVID-19 to be classified as a “neurotoxic illness.” The development and manifestations of neurological complications of COVID-19 may offer rational support to the novel concept of immunopsychiatry and immuno-neuropsychiatry that has the potential to evolve as a subspecialty of general psychiatry. CRS that occurs in severe cases of COVID-19 has rekindled an interest in autoimmune disorders and could offer distant conceptual models for the aetiological search of other medical conditions and even psychiatric conditions. The left-over autoantibodies are held responsible for the lingering symptoms of COVID-19. If schizophrenia is an autoimmune disorder, clozapine, the immunomodulator drug may be hypothetically halting the production of autoreactive antibodies responsible for the psychotic illness. In these desperate times, new treatment strategies may also involve repurposing the existing medications. Studies of COVID-19 might lead to new horizons in immunology

Keywords: Immunity; Cytokine storm; Autoantibodies; COVID-19; Clozapine; Immuno-neuropsychiatry