  We study electromagnetic wave propagation in mediums in which the effective
relative permittivity and the effective relative permeability are allowed to
take any value in the upper half of the complex plane. A general condition is
derived for the phase velocity to be oppositely directed to the power flow.
That extends the recently studied case of propagation in mediums for which the
relative permittivity and relative permeability are both simultaneously
negative, to include dissipation as well. An illustrative case study
demonstrates that in general the spectrum divides into five distinct regions.
