Question: what can drugs do to your immune systems?

Ross King answered on 16 Nov 2015:

Hey! Good question.

Different types of drugs can do many different things to your immune system. For example, people who have cancer often take very powerful drugs to kill the cancer, but they also have side effects on the immune system that can make it very weak, meaning they have more chance of picking up infections. The same goes for people who have just had organ transplants.

Other drugs, which we call ‘biologics’, are quite new drugs that are kind of similar to chemicals our own bodies make and are also often used in the treatment of cancer. Sometimes the immune system thinks that these are bad chemicals and can cause the immune system to be more active. This can also be very dangerous for us if the immune system is activated at the wrong time – the immune system is amazing when it is working properly but it can sometimes be bad news if it gets out of control!