a. [UN-1 7.]
1. Of persons, etc.: Not possessed of good health; weak or sickly in health. b. Path. Not in a sound or healthy condition; diseased, morbid. Also absol.
1611. Cotgr., Mal-sain,… sicklie, crazie, vnhealthie.
1813. J. Thomson, Lect. Inflam., 424. When they exceed this, and take on a growing disposition, they are then unhealthy.
1825. T. Hook, Sayings, Ser. II. II. 61. A watering-place, one of the most fashionable resorts for the idle and unhealthy.
1862. A. Meadows, Man. Midwifery, V. ii. 181. They are apt to take on afterwards unhealthy inflammation.
1877. W. Roberts, Spontaneous Generation, 22. We know that when a wound becomes unhealthy, as surgeons term it, the discharges become offensive.
2. Of places, climate, etc.: Prejudicial or hurtful to health; insalubrious; unwholesome.
1595. in Hakluyt, Voy. (1600), III. 587. The towne was situated in a waterie soile,… very vnhealthy as any place in the Indies.
1616. W. Browne, Brit. Past., II. i. 785. Then mists from marishes,… From standing pooles and fens were following Unhealthy fogs.
1739. Labelye, Piers Westm. Bridge, 72. The opposite Shore,… cover’d with unhealthy Ooze and Filth.
1740. in 10th Rep. Hist. MSS. Comm., App. I. 275. That very unhealthy and dangerous climate.
1806. Med. Jrnl., XV. 17. It was now the most unhealthy season of the year.
1827. Scott, Chron. Canongate, iv. There never was a trade so unhealthy yet, but men would fight to get wark at it.
1884. in Cawston, Street Improv. London (1893), 108. We bought shops and warehouses on just the same terms as we bought unhealthy dwellings.
3. fig. (See HEALTHY a. 3.)
1821. Lamb, Elia, I. Imperfect Sympathies. I do feel the differences of mankind, national or individual, to an unhealthy excess.
1849. W. S. Mayo, Kaloolah, v. (1850), 39. He had set himself … against what his good sense led him to pronounce an unhealthy … excitement.
4. Comb., as unhealthy-looking, -seeming adj.
1890. L. C. D’Oyle, Notches, 93. We steamed away again, through a swampy and unhealthy-looking country.
1890. Retrospect Med., CII. 318. The skin is usually described as dusky,… unhealthy looking, or yellowish.
1913. T. Roosevelt, Autobiog., xii. But if it were true that to cut out rottenness from the body politic meant a momentary check to an unhealthy seeming prosperity, I should not for one moment hesitate to put the knife to the cancer.
