Crossword Genius

Get better as much medicine's taken? Not initially (5)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

rally

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'get better' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)

'much medicine's taken? not initially' is the wordplay.
'much' means to remove the last letter (much but not all of the word).
'medicine' becomes 'Rh' (Rh is an example).
'taken?' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'not initially' becomes 'ally' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'rh' with its final letter taken off is 'r'.
'r'+'ally'='RALLY'

'as' acts as a link.

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for rally that I've seen before include "Get-together" , "Motor sport event" , "several shots" , "Recover; mass meeting" , "Regain one's strength" .)

I've seen this clue in The Times.
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