Definition of "byssinosis" []

• An occupational respiratory disease caused by the long-term inhalation of cotton, flax, or hemp dust and characterized by shortness of breath, coughing, and wheezing. Also called brown lung disease. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Controlling cotton dust, which causes byssinosis, is important."
• "So, the knitting industry with hosiery specifically, we started lobbying that one, we don't have a byssinosis problem in our industry."
• "The whole problem of byssinosis, the cotton dust desease, was something that the Union, being a minority union, couldn't deal with on its own and had to leverage its power by using the government to establish standards and to enforce standards to protect textile workers from disease."