CD4 and lymphopenia: Briefly, GC dampen neutrophil response to inflammatory stimuli (379), increase susceptibility to viral as well as opportunistic infections inducing lymphopenia (mainly of the CD4 + subset) by altering CD4/CD8 (380) and Th1/Th2 ratio subpopulations (381), suppress cytotoxic activity in natural killer cells (382), reduce eosinophil count (383), and reduce mast-cells interfering with IgE-mediated mast-cell degranulation and calcium release (384).