Why is everything linked to inflammation now?

A recent episode of the Oprah Winfrey Podcast revealed a stunning new hypothesis in cancer research. It had nothing to do with artificial intelligence (A.I.) or a new drug’s mechanism. Instead, it was about chronic inflammation.

Winfrey’s guest was Siddhartha Mukherjee, cancer researcher, oncologist and author of the Pulitzer-winning book The Emperor of All Maladies . Partway through their conversation, when she asked about the future of cancer treatment, he said, “There are thousands of dormant cancer cells sitting in your body. Then something happens — I call it the sleeping beauty kiss — that wakes them up. We are realising that that one something is chronic inflammation... It really switches around how we think about cancer... If we could test that one particular kind of inflammation, we would have a bio-marker for future cancers that could even be preventive.”