Learn English – say “suffers from diarrhea?” even if the person does not experience great pain or suffering

word-choice

This prank taught me a lesson. I'm a healthcare provider and was talking to my friends who are known to play with words. While describing a case I said, "Eight out of ten suffered from diarrhea." My friend jumped in between and said "That means those two enjoyed it!"

Best Answer

The wording you used is commonly seen in literature, and there was nothing wrong with your original phrasing. While your friends drew attention to one of the humorous nuances of English, you need not "always" use the word affected instead of the word suffered.

NOAD defines suffer as:

suffer
verb [ trans. ] experience or be subjected to (something bad or unpleasant)
verb [ intrans. ] (suffer from) be affected by or subject to (an illness or ailment) : his daughter suffered from agoraphobia

It's clear from this definition that you used the word properly, despite the jab from your colleagues. Other examples readily found on the internet:

Eight out of 10 suffer from allergies with a wide variety of causes.

Even though golf is seen as a low risk sport, about 3 out of 10 suffer from an overuse injury at some point.

“Among the patients I see, two out of 10 suffer from halitophobia. Women and children are more prone to this disorder,” said Dr Sunita Gupta, head, oral medicine, Maulana Azad Institute of Dental Sciences.

Every 9 women out of 10 suffer from this [premenstrual] syndrome but this problem is more common in females between the ages of 20 to 30.

Clearly, none of the people referenced in the statistics cited by these articles are enjoying their allergies, injuries, halitophobia, or PMS symptoms.

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