Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
Wiktionary
n. (context pathology English) An endemic infectious disease of humans and animals in tropical Africa, caused by a parasitic trypanosome, transmitted by the tsetse fly and characterized by fever, severe headache, joint pains and lymph node swelling in the early stages, followed by a neurological phase of extreme weakness, sleepiness, and deep coma leading to death.
WordNet
n. an encephalitis that was epidemic between 1915 and 1926; symptoms include paralysis of the extrinsic eye muscle and extreme muscular weakness [syn: sleepy sickness, epidemic encephalitis, lethargic encephalitis, encephalitis lethargica]
Wikipedia
Sleeping sickness may refer to:
Medical conditions:
- African trypanosomiasis, also known as African sleeping sickness, is a vector-borne parasitic disease
- Animal trypanosomiasis, also known as nagana or animal African trypanosomiasis
- Eastern equine encephalitis virus, a zoonotic alphavirus and arbovirus present in North, Central and South America and the Caribbean
- Encephalitis lethargica, a form of encephalitis that swept the world in the 1920s
- Fatigue (medical), any one of several other medical conditions that cause lethargy
In arts and entertainment:
- Sleeping Sickness (film), a 2011 German film
- "Sleeping Sickness" (song), a 2008 song by the band City and Colour
Sleeping Sickness is a 2011 German drama film, directed by Ulrich Köhler. It premiered in competition at the 61st Berlin International Film Festival, where Köhler won the Silver Bear for Best Director.
"Sleeping Sickness" is the second single from City and Colour's second album, Bring Me Your Love. The song features vocals from Gordon Downie, the lead singer of The Tragically Hip. The single was certified Gold by the CRIA in digital downloads in May 2009. The song was used by CBC's Hockey Night In Canada during a video tribute at the end of the 2009 Stanley Cup Playoffs.
Usage examples of "sleeping sickness".
Finding cures for cancer, sleeping sickness, treatments for chagres fever, dengue disease, tularemia, and things like that.
In 1916, in one such case, people in Europe and America began to come down with a strange sleeping sickness, which became known as encephalitis lethargica.
And we've called it a kind of sleeping sickness, encephalitis lethargica.
Meningitis, encephalitis - that's a sleeping sickness caused by inflammation of the brain - even venereal diseases.
This was vital since the biting flies brought with them the terrible sleeping sickness that slew man, horse, and ox alike.
The tsetse's awful relative deposits a microbe which produces the Sleeping Sickness.
One day they will find some way to kill him, or something to cure the sleeping sickness, the nagana, that he carries.
And we've called it a kind of sleeping sickness, encephalitis letbargica.
All who had been stricken with the new sleeping sickness were also those who had become the most seriously disfigured by the plasma plague.
Problems such as buharzia, sleeping sickness, and river-blindness were overcome in the 19th century.
While some believe it is just a temporary withdrawal from reality after too long in UR, others suggest it stems from a chemical imbalance in the brain, and liken it to the so called sleeping sickness prevalent over a century ago.
This time the stories are all of the end of the Midsummer Nightmare, or the Sleeping Sickness, or the Dream Curse, or whatever other name the particular newspaper had coined.
The free ride may be provided by mosquitoes, fleas, lice, or tsetse flies that spread malaria, plague, typhus, or sleeping sickness, respectively.