• noun:   (international law) illegality that taints or contaminates a ship or cargo rendering it liable to seizure
• noun:   moral corruption or contamination

  Example: "Ambitious men are led astray by an infection that is almost unavoidable"

• noun:   an incident in which an infectious disease is transmitted
• noun:   (medicine) the invasion of the body by pathogenic microorganisms and their multiplication which can lead to tissue damage and disease
• noun:   (phonetics) the alteration of a speech sound under the influence of a neighboring sound
• noun:   the pathological state resulting from the invasion of the body by pathogenic microorganisms
• noun:   the communication of an attitude or emotional state among a number of people

  Example: "The infection of his enthusiasm for poetry"

Related words...