Leprosy: Why we need to step up the fight against this health issue?

(Representational image)

New Delhi: Leprosy, also known as Hansen's disease, is a long-term infection by the bacteria Mycobacterium leprae or Mycobacterium lepromatosis.

Initially, infections are without symptoms and typically remain static for 5 to 20 years. Symptoms that develop include granulomas of the nerves, respiratory tract, skin, and eyes.

This can also result in lack of ability to feel pain and thus loss of parts of extremities due to repeated injuries or infection due to unnoticed wounds.

Leprosy is spread between people.This is thought to occur through a cough or contact with fluid from the nose of an infected person.

Prevention

Leprosy is endemic in several regions of the world. Currently the only protection has come from vaccination with BCG (Bacillus Calmette-Guerin), a single dose of which gives 50 percent or higher protection against the disease.

BCG is a component of the Expanded Program on Immunization and confers some degree of protection against tuberculosis, which is caused by a mycobacterium allied to M. leprae.

India’s fight against leprosy

The World Health Organization (WHO) directed South-East Asian countries, including India which accounted for 60% per cent of such cases worldwide in 2015, to focus on preventing disabilities in children.

According to WHO, leprosy affected 2,12,000 people all over the globe in 2015. India alone reported 1,27,326 new cases, accounting for 60% of new cases globally.

India is among the 22 countries considered as having a “high burden for leprosy” along with high transmission by WHO. “Despite being eliminated globally as a public health problem in 2000, leprosy continues to mar the lives of individuals, and impacts families and communities.

Though present numbers are a fraction of what was reported a decade ago, they are unacceptable, as an effective treatment for leprosy — multidrug therapy, or MDT — has been available since the 1980s and can fully cure leprosy, comments an expert.

The number of new cases indicates the degree of continued transmission of infection.