Noncommunicable

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Referring to illnesses that are not capable of being transmitted from person to person
2. Describes diseases or conditions that cannot spread from one person to another
3. Pertains to health issues that are not contagious or infectious among people

Etymology: "Noncommunicable" is a plain English compound: the prefix "non-" attached to "communicable," meaning able to be passed from one person to another. The prefix traces back through Old English "nān," meaning "not one" or "none," which is itself built from "ne" (not) and "ān" (one). Over centuries the word shrank from "nān" to "non," and it became the everyday negating prefix used to build countless English words. "Communicable" carries the core idea. It comes from the Latin "communicare," to share or impart, and in medicine it came to describe diseases that spread from person to person. Attaching "non-" flips that meaning, so the word describes conditions such as heart disease or diabetes that do not pass between people.

Synonyms: nontransmissible, noninfectious, chronic, long-term, persistent

Antonyms: communicable, transmissible, infectious, acute