blue flu

See synonyms for blue flu on Thesaurus.com
noun
  1. absenteeism among police officers or firefighters who claim to be ill but are in fact absent to support union contract demands or negotiations: so called from the officers' blue uniforms.

Origin of blue flu

1
First recorded in 1965–70

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024