dengue Meaning, Definition & Usage

noun an infectious disease of the tropics transmitted by mosquitoes and characterized by rash and aching head and joints
dengue fever; dandy fever; breakbone fever.

See Note, below.

(Med.) A specific epidemic disease attended with high fever, cutaneous eruption, and severe pains in the head and limbs, resembling those of rheumatism; -- called also breakbone fever. It occurs in India, Egypt, the West Indies, etc., is of short duration, and rarely fatal. ✍ This disease, when it first appeared in the British West India Islands, was called the dandy fever, from the stiffness and constraint which it grave to the limbs and body. The Spaniards of the neighboring islands mistook the term for their word dengue, denoting prudery, which might also well express stiffness, and hence the term dengue became, as last, the name of the disease. Tully.