The current findings also corroborate basic mechanistic work, indicating that IL-6 is a central activator in the immune pathway, with previous research suggesting a causal pathway with schizophrenia and depression; in mendelian randomization studies, Khandaker et al. report that the functional variant of IL-6R gene is associated with decreased risk of severe depression and psychosis [66]. Here, IL6R is linked to depressive symptom measurement.