A study on the IgE levels of military recruits and association with HLA antigens.

To identify antigen marker(s) on lymphocytes for the immunoregulation of IgE immunoglobulin. For this purpose, IgE determinations were performed on 58 recruits who were arbitrarily selected for HLA typing. Thirty-three recruits with IgE values ranging from 24 to 142 U/ml (71 U/ml (71 U/ml average) showed a slight increase in incidence for HLA-A23, -A33 and BW-15 when compared to a group of 25 recruits whose IgE values ranged from 153 to 2128 U/ml (615 U/ml average). Examination for C-loci specificity indicated that CW-1, CW-3 and CW-4 similar for both groups; however, the "low" IgE group had a frequency of 55.5% of recruits possessing CW-2 antigen compared with only 15% for the "high" group. The value for the "high" IgE appears to be similar to that of the normal population (10% incidence) and only slightly elevated when compared to 7% (2/29) found when the identical CW-2 antisera were tested with laboratory personnel. Thus the associations of HLA-CW2 with the recruits within the "low" IgE group suggests that this HLA marker may be an expression for a suppressed response for IgE immunoglobulin. Viral and bacterial infections, found frequently in these recruits, are discussed as a possible cause of this suppression.