Definition

1. Adjective:
   • Capable of being transmitted by infection: Describes a disease or condition that can be passed from one person, animal, or organism to another through direct or indirect contact.

Usage

• The primary use of "contractable" is in medical and public health contexts to describe the infectious nature of a disease.
• It is typically used attributively (before a noun) or predicatively (after a linking verb like "is" or "are").

Examples

• Adjective:
  • Measles is a highly contractable disease.
  • The health department issued a warning about the new, easily contractable virus.
  • Not all illnesses are contractable; some are genetic.

Advanced Usage

• "contractable" vs. "contagious": While often used interchangeably in casual speech, "contractable" is a broader term meaning "able to be contracted." "Contagious" more specifically describes diseases spread by direct or close contact between individuals.
  • The disease is contractable through contaminated water, but it is not directly contagious from person to person.

Variants and Related Words

• Contract (verb): To acquire or become affected by (a disease).
  • He contracted malaria while traveling.
• Contagious (adjective): (Of a disease) spread from one person or organism to another by direct or indirect contact.
• Communicable (adjective): (Of a disease) able to be transmitted from one person to another; synonymous with "infectious" or "contagious."
• Infectious (adjective): (Of a disease or disease-causing organism) likely to be transmitted to people, organisms, etc., through the environment.

Synonyms

• Transmissible
• Communicable
• Infectious
• Catching (informal)

Antonyms

• Non-contagious
• Non-communicable
• Non-infectious

Adjective

1. (of disease) capable of being transmitted by infection