efficacious
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\n \n Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for June 12, 2024 is:\n \n
\n \n\n efficacious • \\ef-uh-KAY-shus\\ • adjective
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Efficacious is a formal word used to describe something\u2014often a treatment, medicine, or remedy\u2014that has the power to produce a desired result or effect.
\n\n// Companies like to tout the number of efficacious natural ingredients in their beauty products.
\n\n\n \n \n\n Examples:
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\u201cBaking soda is commonly used alongside detergent to fix stinky loads ... but washing soda is the typical go-to for most tough laundry jobs. Baking soda is gentler than washing soda, so it won\u2019t be as efficacious.\u201d \u2014 Leslie Corona, Real Simple Magazine, 29 Dec. 2023
\n \n \n\n Did you know?
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If you guesstimate that efficacious is the effect of combining effective with the suffix -ious, you\u2019re on the right track. Efficacious came to English from the Middle French word efficace (or that word\u2019s Latin source, effic\u0101c- or effic\u0101x), meaning \u201ceffective.\u201d (These words ultimately trace back to the Latin verb efficere, \u201cto make, bring about, produce, carry out.\u201d) English speakers added -ious to effectively create the word we know today. Efficacious is one of many, er, eff words that mean \u201cproducing or capable of producing a result.\u201d Among its synonyms are the familiar adjectives effective and efficient. Efficacious is more formal than either of these; it\u2019s often encountered in medical writing where it describes treatments, therapies, and drugs that produce their desired and intended effects in patients.
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