escalate

verb escalate

• improve — to bring into a more desirable or excellent condition: He took vitamins to improve his health.
• decline — If something declines, it becomes less in quantity, importance, or strength.
• decrease — When something decreases or when you decrease it, it becomes less in quantity, size, or intensity.
• diminish — to make or cause to seem smaller, less, less important, etc.; lessen; reduce.
• drop — a small quantity of liquid that falls or is produced in a more or less spherical mass; a liquid globule.