Zoonosis
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 An animal disease, such as rabies or anthrax, that can be transmitted to humans.
"In his first book since the 2008 essay collection Natural Acts: A Sidelong View of Science and Nature, David Quammen looks at the natural world from yet another angle: the search for the next human pandemic, what epidemiologists call “the next big one.” His quest leads him around the world to study a variety of suspect zoonoses—animal-hosted pathogens that infect humans."
- 2 an animal disease that can be transmitted to humans wordnet
Example
More examples"In his first book since the 2008 essay collection Natural Acts: A Sidelong View of Science and Nature, David Quammen looks at the natural world from yet another angle: the search for the next human pandemic, what epidemiologists call “the next big one.” His quest leads him around the world to study a variety of suspect zoonoses—animal-hosted pathogens that infect humans."
Etymology
From zoo- + (itself from Ancient Greek ζῷον (zōîon, “animal”)) + Ancient Greek νόσος (nósos, “disease”) (compare also nosology); the surface analysis is almost, although not quite, zoo- + -osis; compare also anthroponosis.
Related phrases
More for "zoonosis"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.