sickness
Americannoun
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sicknesses
plural
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a particular disease or malady.
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the state or an instance of being sick; illness.
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nausea; queasiness.
noun
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an illness or disease
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nausea or queasiness
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the state or an instance of being sick
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of sickness
before 1000; Middle English siknesse, seknesse, Old English sēocnesse. See sick 1, -ness
Compare meaning
How does sickness compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
The condition of being unwell or having an illness is sickness. Your sickness during the month of November might mean you miss a lot of school. A well-known, Christian version of wedding vows includes a promise to "have and to hold...in sickness and in health." This means the couple agrees to stay together and support each other whether they're healthy or ill. Some sickness is a chronic or permanent kind of malady, while others are more specific, like morning sickness during pregnancy or a brief flash of sickness when your plane hits a patch of turbulence.
Vocabulary lists containing sickness
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:
Perpetuating these kinds of gravely serious illnesses extends the sickness past the confines of our own bodies, and into the world around us.
From Salon ● Aug. 8, 2026
Chapters in the third person depict the ways that the dog’s uneventful daily life of feedings and naps has been transformed by sickness.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 29, 2026
Burnham is facing massive decisions about who receives sickness and disability benefits, and how much they get, as well as getting young people into work.
From BBC ● Jul. 20, 2026
In a clip from the show, granddaughter Kim Kardashian detailed that her grandmother had survived colon cancer and breast cancer and, in her sunset years, struggled with sickness resulting from the cancer treatments.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 16, 2026
“We’ll have more cover soon. And more sickness because of the wet ground.”
From "The Marrow Thieves" by Cherie Dimaline
"There are sicknesses and we can not find any cure," said 54-year-old Abu Khalil, who has been displaced to Rafah in southern Gaza.
From BBC ● Feb. 18, 2024
The buses were crowded with sicknesses spreading quickly.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 17, 2024
Most startling, an additional 1,970 men at one point were hospitalized with sicknesses, including 72 with what was described as “psychoneurosis.”
From New York Times ● Jan. 12, 2024
Breathing brings these particles deep into the lungs, where they can cause many different sicknesses, from coughs, headaches, and sore throats to asthma, lung problems, and even cancer.
From NewsForKids.net ● Nov. 7, 2023
The three lines are organized by urgency, as in, those with sicknesses versus those of us dying today by some unknown force versus bored visitors.
From "They Both Die at the End" by Adam Silvera
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.
