26984 words

disease

3 definitions • 10 examples
1
(an) illness of people, animals, plants, etc., caused by infection or a failure of health rather than by an accident:

Examples:

outbreak of disease They reported a sudden outbreak of the disease in the south of the country.
symptom of a disease The first symptom of the disease is a very high temperature.
catch/contract a disease She has caught/contracted (= begun to have) a lung disease/disease of the lungs.
Starvation and disease have killed thousands of refugees.
2
something that is considered very bad in people or society:

Examples:

The real disease affecting the country is inflation.
3
a condition of a person, animal, or plant in which its body or structure is harmed because an organ or part is unable to work as it usually does; an illness:

Examples:

[ C ] Mumps is an infectious disease.
[ U ] He suffers from heart disease.
[ U ] Hundreds of thousands of trees died from Dutch elm disease.

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