Hello. I would like to raise a question regarding "a great deal of effort" and "an upsurge of infections".
The first sentence:
- A great deal of effort was required to reach a consensus on this issue.
The second sentence:
- An upsurge of Covid-19 infections is expected to force several countries into lockdown.
May I know why "a great deal of efforts" is wrong but "an upsurge of Covid-19 infections" is acceptable? Shouldn't it be the same?
teal desk 749A great deal of effort was required to reach a consensus on this issue.
This sentence is correct.
teal desk 749An upsurge of Covid-19 infections is expected to force several countries into lockdown.
This either.
teal desk 749May I know why "a great deal of efforts" is wrong but "an upsurge of Covid-19 infections" is acceptable? Shouldn't it be the same?
'a great deal of' is an idiomatic phrase and correct, but how is it related to 'an upsurge of Coivd-19 infections'? These two have different meanings. Why should the correctness of one render the other wrong or vice versa?
A dramatic increase in the number of Covid-19 infections would force countries into lockdown.
A great deal of effort is needed to encourage all people in the country to observe safety measures amid the health crisis.
teal desk 749Why "a great deal of efforts" is wrong?
Why is "a great deal of efforts" wrong?
Note above how to ask your question.
CJ
'a great/good deal of' is used with uncountable nouns. If you can count it, you must use 'a large/great number of'.
We invested a great deal of time and effort in developing the plan.
We recruited a large number of people to develop the plan.
'an upsurge of/in' can be used both with countable and uncountable nouns.
We've experienced an upsurge of accidents over the past two months due to the holidays.
There has been an upsurge in violent crime since January.
You have to decide each time whether the mass noun is right in a given situation. I don't think you can make a general rule that will help here.
"Effort" can be a mass noun, and it is right for "a great deal of". Your efforts might bear fruit, but you expended a great deal of effort. You didn't expend a large number of individual efforts. Well, OK, you did, but that isn't what you mean here.
"Infection" can also be a mass noun, but infection is not what upsurged. The number of individual initial infections did.
The combinations illustrated below were all found online.
'a great deal of' goes with singular nouns only.
a great deal of __________: enthusiasm, misinformation, debt, variation, training, effort, impact, influence, income, debate, ...
If you want the plural, use a large number of __________ : employees, contests, merchants, farm workers, residents, votes, investors, people, portraits, suspected smugglers, ...
'an upsurge of' can go with a singular or a plural.
an upsurge of __________:
nationalist sentiment, earthquake activity, terrorism, violence, the disease, inflation, corruption, productivity, ...
insects, followers, protectionist policies, jobs in cities, interest in China, protests, attacks, injuries, ...
Many of these combinations have to be learned one at a time. Not all of them work the same way. (That's called "grammar".
)
CJ