noun
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Dysentery can be transmitted by contact with water or food that has been contaminated by human waste. Public health and sanitation procedures in developed countries, however, have largely eliminated this means of transmission.
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Etymology
Origin of dysentery
First recorded in 1350–1400; from Medieval Latin dysenteria, from Greek, from dysénter(a) “bad bowels” ( see dys-, enteron) + -ia -ia; replacing Middle English dissenterie, from Old French
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How does dysentery compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
Dysentery is a nasty sounding word for a nasty condition: an intestinal infection that results in diarrhea. There are few things as unpleasant as dysentery, an infectious condition, kind of like the flu, that includes severe diarrhea. Dysentery is common in countries and places with poor health conditions and sewage problems. If the drinking water is filthy, that's a great way to spread dysentery. This word sounds kind of dirty, and that's a good hint to its meaning: the horrible illness of dysentery spreads in dirty, unsafe living conditions.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
It’s more like The Oregon Trail for podcasting, but with less dysentery.
From Slate ● Apr. 5, 2026
By World War II, even as scientists were manufacturing gallons of phages to combat cholera, dysentery, and gangrene in Stalingrad and Leningrad, much the West had given up on phages.
From Salon ● Nov. 20, 2024
Jones plays Isaac Higgintoot, a member of the American Continental Congress who — appropriately, given his last name — died of dysentery while serving as a captain in the Revolutionary War.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 17, 2024
Amin Ahmed Ali fed her tiny son serum through a syringe - she has six-month-old twins slowly recovering from weeks of dysentery.
From BBC ● Apr. 12, 2024
More deadly than the wounds was the dysentery.
From "Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad" by Ann Petry
"They've got tuberculosis, Salmonella, all the dysenteries," says Rodger Farr, a psychiatrist who ministers to the homeless of Los Angeles.
From Time Magazine Archive
Likewise, many of the woeful tragedies of infant summer diarrhea and dysenteries have been tracked to the so-called "innocent house fly."
From The Mother and Her Child by William S. Sadler
They cause much sickness in their season, creating choleras, cramps, and dysenteries.
From The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual by William Kitchiner
Here, at Chicago, which boasts, and with good reason, I believe, of its healthy site, dysenteries and bilious attacks are just now very common, with occasional cases of fever.
From Letters of a Traveller Notes of Things Seen in Europe and America by William Cullen Bryant
It curdles with soap, gives a red colour to the meat that is boiled in it, and, when drank by strangers, never fails to occasion pains in the stomach and bowels; nay, sometimes produces dysenteries.
From Travels through France and Italy by T. (Tobias) Smollett
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
