Virulence
/ˈvɪɹjələns/ noun
noun ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
Noun
- 1 The state of being virulent. countable, uncountable
"Francis was enraged at the interference, and opposition made him more in earnest; but just at this time, the civil war, which had hitherto left their part of the country comparatively quiet, arose with great virulence in their immediate vicinity."
- 2 extreme hostility wordnet
- 3 A measure of how virulent a thing is. countable, uncountable
- 4 extreme harmfulness (as the capacity of a microorganism to cause disease) wordnet
Example
More examples"Goldman Sachs, the American financial powerhouse, is trying to factor into its investment decisions and counsel all possible Omicron outcomes — from a worst-case scenario of greater virulence and vaccine-evasion to the nice surprise that the vaccines remain efficacious, and Omicron turns out to be more benign than its forerunner."
Etymology
From Middle French virulence, from Late Latin virulentia.