TY - JOUR T1 - The conundrum of COVID-19 treatment targets: the close correlation with rheumatology. Response to: ‘Management of rheumatic diseases in the time of covid-19 pandemic: perspectives of rheumatology pracitioners from India’ by Gupta <em>et al</em> and ‘Antirheumatic agents in covid-19: is IL-6 the right target?’ by Capeechi <em>et al</em> JF - Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases JO - Ann Rheum Dis SP - e3 LP - e3 DO - 10.1136/annrheumdis-2020-217545 VL - 80 IS - 1 AU - Sara Monti AU - Carlomaurizio Montecucco Y1 - 2021/01/01 UR - http://ard.bmj.com/content/80/1/e3.abstract N2 - We thank Capecchi et al 1 for their comment on our paper. The authors suggested that interleukin 6 (IL-6) represents the key cytokine responsible for the majority of pulmonary and cardiovascular complications of COVID-19. Similarly, we have received a comment from Gupta et al 2 who reported the management of rheumatological treatments during COVID-19 pandemic among practitioners in India, revealing that choices were apparently made according to the beliefs on the possible relationships between drug mechanism of action and effect on the viral infection. Both correspondence comments highlighted some striking similarities with changes seen in rheumatological conditions such as the systemic effects of chronic inflammation in rheumatoid arthritis, or laboratory findings resembling macrophage activation syndrome, and argued on the potential applications of rheumatological targeted therapies in this new context, especially … ER -