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CD4+ chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) represents an extremely rare example of phenotypic aberrancy within CLL. We present a case of an 86-year-old male veteran with a history of multiple comorbidities who was incidentally diagnosed with CD4+ CLL during a routine peripheral blood workup. This case highlights the diagnostic challenges and characteristic features of CD4+ CLL, including flow cytometric analysis, molecular, and fluorescence in situ hybridization findings. The patient was classified as asymptomatic CLL Rai stage 0, warranting regular monitoring without a need for treatment intervention., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest., (© 2024 The Author(s). eJHaem published by British Society for Haematology and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

SARS CoV-2 has caused a global pandemic leading to significant morbidity and mortality. There is a need to elucidate and further understand the implications of COVID-19 disease on the immune system to develop improved therapeutic strategies. In particular, Natural Killer (NK) cells play an essential role in mediating the innate immune response against viral infections. To better understand the role of innate immunity in COVID-19, we characterized the phenotype of circulating NK cells from 74 COVID-19 patients and 25 controls. Through evaluating the protein expression of activating and inhibitory NK cell surface molecules using dimension reduction analysis and clustering, we identified 4 specific clusters of NK cells specific to disease state (COVID-19 positive or COVID-19 negative) and characterized COVID-19 positive NK cells as: NGK2A+KIR2DL1+NKG2C-. Utilizing blocking antibodies specific for receptors NKG2A and KIR2DL1, we found that both NKG2A and KIR2DL1 blockade markedly enhances the ability of NK cells from COVID-19 positive patients to lyse SARS-Cov-2 infected cells. Overall, this study reveals new insights into NK cell phenotypes during SARS-CoV-2 infection and suggests a therapeutic approach worthy of further investigation to enhance NK cell-mediated responses against the virus., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2023 Lee, Schauner, Burke, Borocz, Vasana, Sobieraj, Giraudo, Jackson, Ansari, Navas, Sakr and Wald.)