Soehnlein, O.; Döring, Y.
Atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ACVD) underlying myocardial infarction (MI), stroke, or peripheral arterial disease (PAD) remains the number one cause of death worldwide.1 ACVD is a lipid-driven inflammatory disease of the medium and large arteries, with endothelial dysfunction mediating recruitment of leucocytes into the arterial wall and subsequent lesion growth. Current treatment options focus on mitigating risk factors such as lipid lowering; more recently, anti-inflammatory therapies such as neutralizing interleukin 1β (IL-1β) have emerged as a viable treatment option.1 Neutrophils, the most abundant circulating white blood cells and first-line defenders of the immune system, have long been underestimated in the pathology of ACVD; yet, evidence from experimental animal studies, accumulated during the last decade, firmly indicates their importance.2–10