pestiferous

pestiferous
    adj 1: contaminated with infecting organisms; "dirty wounds";
           "obliged to go into infected rooms"- Jane Austen [syn:
           {dirty}, {pestiferous}]
    2: likely to spread and cause an epidemic disease; "a
       pestilential malignancy in the air"- Jonathan Swift; "plaguey
       fevers" [syn: {pestilent}, {pestilential}, {pestiferous},
       {plaguey}]
    3: tending to corrupt or pervert [syn: {corruptive},
       {perversive}, {pestiferous}]
    4: causing irritation or annoyance; "tapping an annoying rhythm
       on his glass with his fork"; "aircraft noise is particularly
       bothersome near the airport"; "found it galling to have to
       ask permission"; "an irritating delay"; "nettlesome
       paperwork"; "a pesky mosquito"; "swarms of pestering gnats";
       "a plaguey newfangled safety catch"; "a teasing and
       persistent thought annoyed him"; "a vexatious child"; "it is
       vexing to have to admit you are wrong" [syn: {annoying},
       {bothersome}, {galling}, {irritating}, {nettlesome}, {pesky},
       {pestering}, {pestiferous}, {plaguy}, {plaguey}, {teasing},
       {vexatious}, {vexing}]
    

Pestiferous \Pes*tif"er*ous\, a. [L. pestiferus, pestifer;
   pestis pest + ferre to bear: cf. F. pestif[`e]re.]
   1. Pest-bearing; pestilential; noxious to health; malignant;
      infectious; contagious; as, pestiferous bodies. "Poor,
      pestiferous creatures begging alms." --Evelyn.
      "Unwholesome and pestiferous occupations." --Burke.
      [1913 Webster]

   2. Noxious to peace, to morals, or to society; vicious;
      hurtful; destructive; as, a pestiferous demagogue.
      [1913 Webster]

            Pestiferous reports of men very nobly held. --Shak.
      [1913 Webster]
    

87 Moby Thesaurus words for "pestiferous":
      aggravating, annoying, bad, bad for, baneful, bothering,
      bothersome, catching, communicable, contagious, contaminated,
      deadly, destructive, disturbing, endemic, envenomed, epidemial,
      epidemic, epiphytotic, epizootic, exasperating, foul, galling,
      harassing, harmful, importunate, importune, infectious, infective,
      injurious, inoculable, insalubrious, insanitary, irking, irksome,
      irritating, malign, malignant, mephitic, miasmal, miasmatic,
      miasmic, morbific, noisome, noxious, pandemic, pathogenic, peccant,
      pesky, pestering, pestilent, pestilential, plaguesome, plaguey,
      plaguing, poisonous, polluted, provoking, septic, sporadic,
      spreading, tainted, taking, teasing, tiresome, tormenting, toxic,
      toxicant, toxiferous, troublesome, troubling, unhealthful,
      unhealthy, unhygienic, unsanitary, unwholesome, venenate,
      veneniferous, venenous, venomous, vexatious, vexing, virulent,
      wearisome, worrisome, worrying, zymotic