jungle fever

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jungle fever (uncountable)

1. (medicine) Any of several tropical diseases, but especially malaria.
   • 1913, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Return of Tarzan, New York: Ballantine Books, published 1963, page 181:

     Thuran, down with an attack of jungle fever, lay in the shelter among the branches of their tree of refuge.

2. (slang, derogatory) Attraction of a person of non-African descent towards people of African descent.

   Synonym: black fever

• “jungle fever n.”, in Green’s Dictionary of Slang, Jonathon Green, 2016–present