IL1A and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: IL‐1α has been shown to be elevated in the lungs of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease patients 24, and recent work has identified anti‐IL‐1α autoantibodies in the blood of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis patients 25 and increased levels of IL‐1Ra in lung allograft recipients who developed BOS 26, suggesting that extracellular IL‐1α may be an undesirable and potentially harmful factor in fibrotic lung diseases.