Word of the Day

: May 8, 2017

panacea

noun pan-uh-SEE-uh

What It Means

: a remedy for all ills or difficulties : cure-all

panacea in Context

Georgette said, "I don't know if hybrid cars are a panacea for the world's environmental issues, but they seem to be a step in the right direction."

"… while an uptick in subscriptions is certainly a good thing, it is unlikely to be a panacea for what ails newspapers." — Leonard Pitts, The Miami Herald, 3 Mar. 2017

Did You Know?

Panacea is from Latin, and the Latin word, in turn, is from Greek panakeia. In Greek, panakēs means "all-healing," combining pan- ("all") and akos, which means "remedy." The Latin designation Panacea or Panaces has been awarded to more than one plant at one time or other, among them the herb today known as Prunella vulgaris, whose common name is self-heal. More often than not, panacea is used when decrying a claim made for a remedy that seems too good to be true. Most likely that's what the author is doing in a 1625 anatomical treatise, describing "a certaine medicine made of saffron, quick silver, vermilion, antimonie, and certaine sea shels made up in fashion of triangular lozenges," and calling it a panacea.