malady
/ˈmalədi
/noun (plural maladies) literary
1A disease or ailment: an incurable malady...
- Over the years, curcumin has gained much attention in the scientific world for its benefits on maladies including HIV, cancer and Alzheimer's disease.
- Since fiber also helps prevent cancer, heart disease, diabetes and other maladies, you should be screaming for fiber by now.
- Why spend a lot of money hunting down the cause of an incurable malady when it isn't going to make any difference in the outcome?
Synonyms
illness, sickness, ailment, disorder, complaint, disease, infection, indisposition, affliction, infirmity
informal lurgy, bug, virus
Australian informal wog
1.1A serious problem: the nation’s maladies...
- The United States is waking up from a serious malady.
- This malady becomes even more serious since Gujarat is just one limb of the body called India.
- Then is there a serious malady that demands immediate attention?
Origin
Middle English: from Old French maladie, from malade 'sick', based on Latin male 'ill' + habitus 'having (as a condition)'.
malaria from mid 18th century:
Before people understood that malaria was transmitted by mosquitoes, they attributed the disease to an unwholesome condition of the atmosphere in marshy districts. It was particularly prevalent in Italy, and especially near Rome. In a letter of 1740 the writer and statesman Horace Walpole wrote of ‘A horrid thing called the mal'aria, that comes to Rome every summer and kills one’. Italian mal'aria is a contraction of mala aria ‘bad air’. Malady (Middle English) comes from a similar source, being from Lain male ‘ill’ and habitus ‘having (as a condition)’.