2. Describe the potential problems that would arise if a person had an acquired inability to phagocytize pathogens. Could the person survive in a normal environment such as a college campus? What defects in the phagocyte might cause lack of phagocytosis?
Phagocytes like neutrophils and macrophages are the front line of defense against bacteria. The adaptive response takes many days to fully activate. Without the ability to phagocytose bacteria a person would be at an increased risk from bacterial infections. On a college campus the dangers would come from bacteria such as S. aureus and N. meningitidis.
The defect may come in receptors to antigens that signal the cell to phagocytose or in the ability of the phagocyte to lyse the ingested cell. These are just a few examples.
Some pathogens can withstand the lysing because they actually thrive in the acidic environment of a phagolysosome. Some pathogens prevent the phagosome and lysosome from fusing. An example would be L. pneumophila. And finally some pathogens avoid phagocytosis by preventing it in the first place. S. pneumoniae has a polysaccharide capsule that prevents the phagocyte from ingesting the bacterium.
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