translate English to French: This term came into common use in the early 1990s to designate diseases with the potential to cause important negative effects on people, their economies or their environments, and which either are newly-recognized by science (e.g. SARS) or were previously known but have acquired a new importance (e.g. West Nile virus imported into North America).
Ce terme s'est rÃ©pandu au dÃ©but des annÃ©es 1990 pour dÃ©signer les maladies ayant la possibilitÃ© de provoquer de graves effets nÃ©gatifs sur les personnes, leurs Ã©conomies ou leurs environnements et qui viennent d'Ãªtre reconnues par la science (p. ex. le SRAS) ou qui Ã©taient connues prÃ©alablement, mais qui ont acquis une nouvelle importance (p. ex. le virus du Nil occidental importÃ© en AmÃ©rique du Nord).