an infectious nonvenereal disease of tropical climates with early symptoms resembling syphilis, characterized by red skin eruptions and, later, pain in the joints: it is caused by the spiral bacterium Treponema pertenue
Also called: framboesia
Word origin
C17: of Carib origin
yaws in American English
(jɔz)
noun
a tropical infectious disease caused by a spirochete (Treponema pertenue) and characterized by raspberrylike skin eruptions followed sometimes by destructive lesions of the skin and bones