Desperately means with the wild urgency of somebody running out of hope. Desperately trying, desperately needed, desperately unhappy.
With a verb it means fighting hard against the odds: desperately trying to hold on. With an adjective it works as an intensifier meaning extremely, and usually about something bad — desperately poor, desperately ill, desperately short of time. Desperately needed is one of the commonest pairs in reporting. Note desperate, desperation; and that desperately in love is the one warm use, borrowed from the same urgency.
1adverbdesperatelyWith the urgency of somebody running out of hope.
“The lost hikers desperately waved at the helicopter flying overhead.”
2adverbextremelyExtremely, usually about something bad.
“The hospital is desperately short of nurses this winter.”
desperately is a manner of urgency.
Proto-Indo-European
*speh₁-
Latin
dēspērātus
Middle English
desperat — desperate
English
desperate
English, today
desperately
Built from
From desperate + -ly. desperate comes from Middle English desperat (“desperate”), borrowed from Latin dēspērātus, perfect passive participle of dēspērō (“to be without hope”), see -ate. The noun is derived from the adjective or from the Latin source through substantivization, see -ate.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA