Immunogenicity, parturition and the prostaglandins.

Immunologists have long suspected that maintenance of pregnancy (viable placentation) is contingent upon the suppressed maternal immune response. Curiously, it has never been suggested that the termination of pregnancy at term might in some way be triggered by the un-blocking of this maternal immune suppression. It is the hypothesis of this paper that maintenance and termination of pregnancy are contravening expressions of a maternal-fetal immunologic regulatory response. The role of the prostaglandins in parturition, and the immune response, is discussed.