Introduction
The body's immune system works to protect us from infections and cancer. However, an abnormal immune response to the body’s own proteins (e.g. the myelin sheath surrounding nerve fibres in MS), or exogenous proteins (e.g. pollen or a food constituent) can cause serious life threatening damage to the body.
These ‘hypersensitivity disorders’ include common conditions such as allergies, asthma, MS, rheumatoid arthritis, organ transplant rejection and Type 1 diabetes.
Healthy individuals have a balanced response to the antigens that can trigger allergic and autoimmune disorders in susceptible individuals. By contrast, patients suffering from these diseases have a heightened sensitivity to such antigens.
The ideal therapeutic strategy is to reinstate the normal immune balance, whilst avoiding global immune suppression and hence maintain the immune response to infectious agents.
