Quick Take
A social media post claims that the translation of the word “Coronavirus” means a heart attack virus when translated from Latin to English language. We fact-checked and found this claim to be False.
The Claim
A Twitter user shares a video in which the narrator shows that when one type “Latin to English” in the Google search field and then insert “cor ona virus” in the Google Translate form with one space after the first syllable and two spaces before “virus.” The translation is claimed to be ‘heart attack virus’.
Fact Check
Does the word ‘Coronavirus’ mean heart attack virus in the Latin language?
No. The translation shown in the video circulated on social media only relied on the intentional misspelling of the word. If the word ‘Coronavirus’ is being translated without any intentionally misspelled words, the translation would only be ‘coronavirus’.’
Coronaviruses are a large group of viruses that have crown-like thorns on their surface. The word ‘Corona’, when translated from Latin to English, translates to ‘Crown’.
The Latin word for crown is ‘Coronam‘, and from a visual standpoint, coronaviruses have crown-like protrusions on their surface, as shown below, because of which the virus is named Coronavirus.
The claimant intentionally misspelled and inserted artificial spaces, because of which the translation was incorrect. When the term was typed in without extraneous spaces intended to change its meaning, the service did not produce any glitches, as shown below.
Google translate is not 100% accurate, and itself puts a disclaimer stating, “No automated translation is perfect nor is it intended to replace human translators.” Thus the claim stands false.
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