Review of: "Sputum Interleukin-32 in childhood asthma: correlation with IL-1β"

Potential competing interests: No potential competing interests to declare.In this work by Louhaichi et al, the authors describe the association between the proinflammatory cytokines IL-32 and IL-1b in childhood asthma.Both inflammatory cytokines were measured in induced sputum from a cohort of children with either mild, moderate, or severe conditions.Data presented in this report showed that total IL-32 protein (and RNA) are significantly higher in children with severe conditions and that IL-32 significantly correlate with IL-1b.The study is interesting given that earlier investigations on IL-32 and asthma were mostly carried out on cohorts of older adults.The association between IL-32 and IL-1b is also of high interest as increasing evidence point to the potential role of IL-1b in multiple allergic diseases including allergic rhinitis, asthma, and atopy, which turns this cytokine into a potential therapeutic target.