Final answer:
Viruses do not cause wounds because they infect cells on a microscopic level, often disrupting internal cellular processes without breaking the skin. They can trigger various diseases by evading immune responses and affecting cell functions.
Step-by-step explanation:
Viruses do not cause wounds because they do not physically breach the skin's surface like mechanical injuries. Instead, viruses infect host cells and can cause illness by disrupting cellular processes, triggering immune responses, or causing cell death through processes like budding, where the infected cell is not immediately destroyed but may cease to function normally. Although some viruses can remain latent without symptoms, others lead to diseases that range from mild to severe, evading immune responses and sometimes becoming resistant to antiviral drugs.
While the outer layer of skin, the epidermis, is an effective barrier against pathogens, viruses typically need a host cell to reproduce and do not initiate the type of tissue damage that results in open wounds. Instead, their damage is more subtle, impacting the body's internal environment and may result in cellular malfunction or death, rather than an external wound.