牛津词典公布2021年度词汇：Vax(3)

Casper Grathwohl, the president of Oxford Languages, said: “When reviewing the language evidence, vax stood out as an obvious choice. The word’s dramatic spike in usage caught our attention first. Then we ran the analysis and a story started to emerge, revealing how vax sat at the centre of our preoccupations this year.
The notion of vaccines have been in the English language since the late 1790s, around the time Edward Jenner found that cowpox could be used as a vaccine against the deadly smallpox virus.
The dictionary publisher assessed the frequency in use of the word by looking at news content from around the world.
Dr Mercedes Durham, a reader in sociolinguistics at Cardiff University, said the choice of “vax” made sense because of its adaptability. “The word itself, to me it almost has a meme quality. With a meme you take the picture and add things, words, on to it. In some ways you take ‘vax’ and add ‘passport’ or ‘anti’ or ‘double’ and because it’s such a short word you can add different things on to it,” she said.