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View synonyms for pernicious

pernicious

[ per-nish-uhs ]

adjective

  1. causing insidious harm or ruin; ruinous; injurious; hurtful:

    pernicious teachings;

    a pernicious lie.

    Synonyms: malicious, noxious, baneful, damaging, destructive, deleterious, detrimental, harmful

  2. deadly; fatal:

    a pernicious disease.

    Synonyms: lethal

  3. Obsolete. evil; wicked.


pernicious

/ pəˈnɪʃəs /

adjective

  1. wicked or malicious

    pernicious lies

  2. causing grave harm; deadly
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012


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Derived Forms

  • perˈniciously, adverb
  • perˈniciousness, noun
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Other Words From

  • per·nicious·ly adverb
  • per·nicious·ness noun
  • unper·nicious adjective
  • unper·nicious·ly adverb
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Word History and Origins

Origin of pernicious1

First recorded in 1515–25; from Latin perniciōsus “ruinous,” from pernici(ēs) “ruin” (from per- per- + -nici-, combining form of nex “death, murder” + -ēs, noun suffix) + -ōsus -ous
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Word History and Origins

Origin of pernicious1

C16: from Latin perniciōsus, from perniciēs ruin, from per- (intensive) + nex death
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Example Sentences

We will pursue every legal avenue we can to block this pernicious law.

To his credit, Rhodes does not pretend to have all of the answers about how to stop such pernicious trends.

It is this government subsidy in the form of tax-exempt treatment that is really pernicious.

Driven to solve deep, pernicious and socially significant problems, but with an embedded pragmatism, Damo is keen to keep growing far out from its parent’s shade.

Last February, according to NPR, China’s legislature started taking steps to “uproot the pernicious habit of eating wild animals.”

He simply rode out the same blandly pernicious progressivism that elites in both parties embrace.

Even more pernicious is this: Look at who these men are actually contacting.

In the case of Hollywood actresses, too, this expectation takes on an even more pernicious dimension.

Cancer is the most pernicious, insidious, disgusting disease of life.

I spoke to my students about mobilizing against this pernicious threat to our civilization.

It occurs in well-marked cases of pernicious anemia and leukemia, and, much less commonly, in very severe symptomatic anemias.

In pernicious anemia they are always greatly diminished, and an increase should exclude the diagnosis of this disease.

Megaloblasts are found in pernicious anemia, and with extreme rarity in any other condition.

Pathologically, normoblasts occur in severe symptomatic anemia, leukemia, and pernicious anemia.

A few of these may be present in very marked leukocytosis or any severe blood condition, as pernicious anemia.

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