I've just heard on BBC Radio 4:
A man is seriously ill after having been hit by a police car.
Is this a correct use of ill (assuming that he hasn't contracted an infection)? I'd not have used ill of an injury, however serious.
asked Dec 6, 2014 at 12:06
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I would agree. Illness exists at the biological level (microbe, virus, gland, body chemistry, etc). You're not ill, but injured, when you cut off your big toe with the lawn mower, etc.– TimRCommented Dec 6, 2014 at 12:25
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2Unless further information was offered, we cannot know if the term was used correctly or not. Could be that the person seriously injured has a ruptured spleen for all we know.– Mari-Lou ACommented Dec 6, 2014 at 12:32
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Free of a broader context, I would under that the man was possibly in severe trauma and not necessarily injured. This is possible is certain accidents. On the other hand, illness does not have to be due to an infection or disease -- even injuries lead to illness.– KrisCommented Dec 6, 2014 at 13:18
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1Based on US usage, using "ill" was a stretch, though probably not technically incorrect. (I would perhaps said "was in serious conditions", though one would have to read the source report to see if that's correct.) However, remember that this was radio and likely there was some degree of improvisation, if not by the announcer himself then by some writer who had about 30 seconds to "translate" the story from wire reports, etc.– Hot LicksCommented Dec 6, 2014 at 13:43
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In serious condition, singular.– TimRCommented Dec 6, 2014 at 14:51
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3 Answers
To me, the choice of words makes a difference here.
I would use injury to refer to a laceration or a contusion, anything that happens rather suddenly.
The word "ill" feels like a better fit when talking about a condition of pain and suffering that lasts. The speaker wanted to express that the man is having severe health problems as a consequence of the accident. "Injury" would be a good word to describe the trauma at the time of the accident. "ill" however feels like the proper word to describe the condition he is in after the accident.
The speaker could've said:
A man is seriously ill after having been injured by a police car.
He got hit by a car -> he was injured -> he lost a lot of blood -> now he's in the hospital, seriously ill.
Even though he's obviously still injured as well, the state he now is in is better described as being ill. His condition has simply gotten worse over time, either as a direct consequence of his injury or for reasons not (e.g. an infection) or only partially (blood loss following the injury) related to the actual accident. To convey that this development occurred and isn't necessarily directly related to his injury during the accident, the speaker chose to say that he's seriously ill.
Maybe that helps clarify it for you.
You stated that you wouldn't say "ill of an injury". I think what the speaker meant in this case was "ill due to the consequences of an injury".
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@CarSmack Well I'm German so I can relate to being uncertain about the contextual meaning of English words, even commonly used ones. In addition to that I figured there's no harm in providing too much information, so why not go for it.– J_LVCommented Dec 6, 2014 at 20:04
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This is webster's definition of ill
1 a chiefly Scottish :immoral, vicious b :resulting from, accompanied by, or indicative of an evil or malevolent intention c :attributing evil or an objectionable quality 2 a :causing suffering or distress b comparative also ill·er superlative also illest (1) :not normal or sound (2) :not in good health; also :nauseated
I would think they meant 'suffering or distress'
I personally wouldn't have used ill, but hey, it's BBC; I guess they know what they're doing
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2OED's definition concurs with this: Of health or bodily condition: Unsound, disordered. Hence, of persons (formerly, also, of parts of the body): Out of health, sick, indisposed, not well; almost always used predicatively.– Andrew Leach ♦Commented Dec 6, 2014 at 12:15
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2BBC is a British Broadcasting Corporation, so you should not be using an American dictionary to check their language. Commented Dec 6, 2014 at 12:33
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1You cannot just drop the word causing from the definition. That part describes ill as something that causes distress or suffering. Think along the lines of an ill omen. I hardly think the BBC meant the man has turned into a cause of much stress and suffering because he was hit by a car! Commented Dec 6, 2014 at 13:15
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1@PeterShor: as long as the American dictionary starts off with a mainly Scottish use of the lemma, it might still shed some light on British usage, even by an English presenter. But in any dictionary, superfluous verbs are rare, so leaving them out of a definition doesn't seem to be a good idea, wherever your dictionary was edited :) Commented Dec 6, 2014 at 13:18
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1It is unusual usage of the term 'ill', both by the BBC and in the UK generally. It would, as someone suggested, be more common to say the person was in a 'serious condition', or 'seriously injured'.– WS2Commented Dec 6, 2014 at 13:52
Another example of us damn Colonists destroying the King's English. In the US, "injured" is usually blunt-force trauma, "sick" is a result of disease, and "ill" is almost always going to include some vomiting.
US Dept. of Labor uses the term "injury" to describe obvious "cause and effect" damage, and "illness" as something where the cause is not immediately apparent.
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As I implied in another comment, in the UK we would normally not use 'ill' in this context. I don't believe there is any significant difference in the way these things are described in the UK versus North America.– WS2Commented Dec 6, 2014 at 13:55