flatline
/ˈflatlʌɪn
/verb [no object]
1 informal (Of a person) die: they injected themselves with a deadly drug and flatlined...
- I was flatlining with a DNR.
- I've flatlined, I've been counted out in a coma, and I've been tortured by Pesto.
- Having Janet flatline is a little cheap for a cliffhanger, considering there was never any indication that her situation was close to critical.
1.1(Of a project or undertaking) fail: her career has flatlined about three times already...
- A California woman pregnant with twins, collapses, then flat lines.
- Investors are saying I mean, GM is a flat line here.
- Right now, we're pretty much at the flat line.
2Fail to increase; remain static: their share of the vote has flatlined at about 3%...
- But the party's vote share virtually flatlined.
- The Conservatives flatlined, dead on arrival with no increase in their national share of the vote - and yet the headline story is about all the seats they won and all the seats Labour lost.
- Recall their respective sweeps of each other in the season's first half, and now their more recent ‘message games’ amid defending home turf just when it appeared they had flatlined.
Derivatives
flatliner
- Being an atheist, I don't believe in a soul, so the revived flatliners are still the same person they were when they ‘died’ (providing there was not significant brain damage).
- Maybe it's because some organisations don't recognise that their intranet is a flatliner.
Origin
1980s: from flat1 + line1 (with reference to the continuous straight line displayed on a heart monitor, indicating death).