Pandemic
Etymology
From Greek pan, "all," and demos, "the people" — literally affecting all the people. It sits at the top of a scale: an outbreak becomes an epidemic in a region, and a pandemic when it crosses borders on a large scale. The term marks reach and spread, not necessarily severity, though the two often travel together.
noun · /pan-DEM-ik/
An outbreak of disease that spreads across many countries and affects a large share of the population.
What it names
The scale that turns a local outbreak into a global event — a word whose weight most of us now understand firsthand.
Example
The pandemic reshaped how millions of people worked, traveled, and gathered.
Related idea
An epidemic is contained within a region; a pandemic spans countries or the globe.