Covid-19: Cambridge Dictionary updates 'quarantine' and adds 'elbow-bump'

Boris Johnson carried out a press conference whilst in quarantine at 10, Downing Street

The word "quarantine" has taken on an extra meaning and been named "word of the year" by the Cambridge Dictionary.

Editors said the word was now "synonymous with lockdown" and relates to staying at home to avoid catching the disease.

Previously it was only defined in relation to a person or animal "suspected of being contagious".

Other words on the 2020 shortlist included "lockdown" and "pandemic", it added.

On Tuesday, Oxford Dictionaries said it had expanded its word of the year to encompass several "Words of an Unprecedented Year".

A young family working from home during lockdown

Cambridge Dictionary said quarantine was the third most looked-up word overall this year, after "hello" and "dictionary".

It recorded a surge of searches for "quarantine" in March, when restrictions were imposed.

Wendalyn Nichols, its publishing manager, said: "The words that people search for reveal not just what is happening in the world, but what matters most to them in relation to those events.

"Neither coronavirus nor Covid-19 appeared among the words that Cambridge Dictionary users searched for most this year.

"We believe this indicates people have been fairly confident about what the virus is."

The new sense of the word, defining it as "a general period of time in which people are not allowed to leave their homes or travel freely, so that they do not catch or spread a disease", has been added to the dictionary.

'HyFlex and elbow bump'

Other news words included "HyFlex", which is short for hybrid flexible and denotes a type of teaching where some students are physically present in class and others join from a distance online.

As a result of people stopping shaking hands, kissing or hugging since the outbreak of Covid-19, the phrase "elbow bump" has also been added.

It is defined in the dictionary as "a friendly greeting in which you touch someone's elbow with your elbow".