Blood Pressure Control: A Facelift

for Macrophages? To the Editor: Machnik et al1,2 recently demonstrated a new physiological role for macrophages in regulating salt-dependent volume and blood pressure by a vascular endothelial growth factor C–depen-dent buffering mechanism. In line with this work, they now extend their work demonstrating that the mononuclear phagocyte system depletion induces salt-sensitive hypertension in rats.1,2 These findings promote a new view on a protective role for macrophages in hypertension. Although cardiovascular inflam-mation has been widely evidenced to have detrimental effect on blood pressure and target organ damage,3 the common view needs to be differentiated, because macrophages in the lymphatic compartment seem to be protective with respect to salt-sensitive blood pressure regulation