Department of Redundancy Department
Much of the world is getting scared of SARS, which stands for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome. The only problem is that “severe” and “acute” are so much the same word, they are used as synonyms for each other in the dictionary. I know it makes a better acronym to include a vowel, but still.
Yes, I think about this stuff.
Clever, except that “acute” is the opposite of “chronic” in medical terms.
Well, that explains it.
[EMILY LITELLA]
Never mind.
[/EMILY LITELLA]
Acute is not really the opposite of chronic. They are just terms used to describe the length of time from infection to onset. Acute is generally within 24 hours and chronic is anything longer than roughly 2-3 days.
How did chronic enter the conversation?
I’m confused.
“I know it makes a better acronym to include a vowel, but still.”
So why not ARS?
Because it would make speakers of British/Australian English giggle.
Yeah, but that’s what we’re going for, right?
How about M-CADS: Mystery Cough and Die Syndrome
Because it would make South Park fans giggle.
FAPS: Fear Asian Persons Syndrome
Severe
Hysteria
Inducing
Talk
Syndrome
____________
I go now.