History of recurrent mucocutaneous herpes correlates with relatively low interferon production by herpes simplex virus‐exposed cultured monocytes

Monocytes separated from blood specimens of healthy voluntary blood donors were infected with herpes simplex virus (HSV) 1 or 2. The amount of interferon produced by the HSV‐exposed monocytes was found to be donor‐specific and was similar whether tested with HSV 1 or HSV 2. The interferon levels in repeated blood specimens from a given donor were relatively stable within an observation period of a few months. The survey was expanded by testing 27 persons with history of recurrent herpes disease and 16 control persons without such history. HSV‐exposed monocytes of the controls produced significantly higher amounts of interferon than those of the patients with lesions of recurrent herpes (mean levels 145 and 58 IU/ml, respectively; P < 0.05). A correlation was also found between the antibody status of the cell donor and the capability of the monocytes to produce interferon when infected with HSV 1 or HSV 2: the interferon responses of monocytes of seronegative cell donors were significantly higher than those of cultures from donors with complement fixing antibodies against HSV (P < 0.01).