Akiko Iwasaki told me that the central pathology caused by SARS-CoV2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2) was “immunological misfiring”—a dysregulation of immune cells. I had not even heard the term before, but its immensity hit me: at its core, the pandemic, too, was a disease of cells. Yes, there was the virus, but viruses are inert, lifeless, without cells.
