Leprosy is India's secret epidemic: report

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Leprosy is India's secret epidemic, says report


(CBS) If you listen to the Indian government, leprosy has been conquered. But if you chance to meet any of the 130,000 new patients diagnosed with it each year, you get quite a different story.

That's according to a new investigation from the Guardian.


India has more new cases each year than the rest of the world combined, according to the report. Partly, that's due to India's enormous population, more than one billion people, says the World Bank. But another part is that the country has drastically reduced funding to combat the disease.


Leprosy is India's secret epidemic, says report - HealthPop - CBS News
 
Thalidomide cures it... if caught early IIRC.

Just don't have kids while on it, but if you have Leprosy, what're the odds of you having sex anyway?
 
I'm just waiting for smallpox to pop back up. You damn well know it's out there somewhere waiting.
 
Leprosy is from the same bacterial family as TB. It's an acid fast bacillus somewhere (evolutionarily) between a fungus and a bacteria (though technically a bacteria).

It's hard to get, but once you get it, it's hard to manage.
 
Granny tol' Uncle Ferd he can't go armadiller huntin' with his friends no more
:confused:
Eating armadillos blamed for leprosy in the South
4/27/2011 - Disease likely spreads when people handle, eat the animals, which carry bacteria for disfiguring disease
With some genetic sleuthing, scientists have fingered a likely culprit in the spread of leprosy in the southern United States: the nine-banded armadillo. DNA tests show a match in the leprosy strain between some patients and these prehistoric-looking critters — a connection scientists had suspected but until now couldn't pin down. "Now we have the link," said James Krahenbuhl, who heads a government leprosy program that led the new study.

Only about 150 leprosy cases occur each year in the U.S., mostly among travelers to places like India, Brazil and Angola where it's more common. The risk of getting leprosy from an armadillo is low because most people who get exposed don't get sick with the ancient scourge, known medically as Hansen's disease and now easily treatable. Armadillos are one of the very few mammals that harbor the bacteria that cause the sometimes disfiguring disease, which first shows up as an unusual lumpy skin lesion.

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Nine-banded long-nosed armadillos harbor the bacteria that causes leprosy.

Researchers at the National Hansen's Disease Programs in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, led an international team of scientists who published their findings in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine. They think it requires frequent handling of armadillos or eating their meat for leprosy to spread. DNA samples were taken from 33 wild armadillos in Arkansas, Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas, where they're sometimes referred to as "hillbilly speed bumps" because they're often run over by cars.

Scientists also took skin biopsies from 50 leprosy patients being treated at a Baton Rouge clinic. Three-quarters had never had foreign exposure, but lived in Southern states where they could have been exposed to armadillos. An analysis found that samples from the patients and armadillos were genetically similar to each other and were different from leprosy strains found elsewhere in the world. The unique strain was found in 28 armadillos and 25 patients.

More Eating armadillos blamed for leprosy - Health - Infectious diseases - msnbc.com
 
I'm just waiting for smallpox to pop back up. You damn well know it's out there somewhere waiting.

Could happen as more and more people sign waivers against taking certain vaccines. We recently had a 27 yr old (who never took the vaccine) here in NM diagnosed with measles. She got it during a trip to Europe and exposed everyone on the way back to Santa Fe to it. NM Dept of Desease Control was tracking people down from Baltimore,Washington etc. in Feb,letting them know they could have been exposed to it.


Whooping cough is another one we have seen a rise in. Brought to the States by illegals and others from other countries that were never vaccinated. Deadly to infants.
 
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I'm just waiting for smallpox to pop back up. You damn well know it's out there somewhere waiting.

Could happen as more and more people sign waivers against taking certain vaccines. We recently had a 27 yr old (who never took the vaccine) here in NM diagnosed with measles. She got it during a trip to Europe and exposed everyone on the way back to Santa Fe to it. NM Dept of Desease Control was tracking people down from Baltimore,Washington etc... in Feb,letting them know they could have been exposed to it.


Whooping cough is another one we have seen a rise in. Brought to the States by illegals and others from other countries that were never vaccinated. Deadly to infants.

We don't vaccinate against smallpox anymore (barring a select few).

Some people who are immune lose their immunity too. I had the MMR at the time of my birth, and must checked my titers to find out I was only immune to mumps. So I had to restart that shot series.

The rise in Pertussis/whooping cough is as much attributable to the dumbasses who refuse to get the Tdap shot due to fears of autism.
 
I'm just waiting for smallpox to pop back up. You damn well know it's out there somewhere waiting.

Could happen as more and more people sign waivers against taking certain vaccines. We recently had a 27 yr old (who never took the vaccine) here in NM diagnosed with measles. She got it during a trip to Europe and exposed everyone on the way back to Santa Fe to it. NM Dept of Desease Control was tracking people down from Baltimore,Washington etc... in Feb,letting them know they could have been exposed to it.


Whooping cough is another one we have seen a rise in. Brought to the States by illegals and others from other countries that were never vaccinated. Deadly to infants.

We don't vaccinate against smallpox anymore (barring a select few).

Some people who are immune lose their immunity too. I had the MMR at the time of my birth, and must checked my titers to find out I was only immune to mumps. So I had to restart that shot series.

The rise in Pertussis/whooping cough is as much attributable to the dumbasses who refuse to get the Tdap shot due to fears of autism.

Yes, I agree.. Now when the schools contact you letting you know your children are due for shots...they ask for either updated shot records or a waiver from your doctor to exempt your kids from getting the vaccines. I know from living in NM that waiving any vaccines is stupid with the amount of illegals that show up here and bring illnesses with them due to no regulations in their own countries. We have public service announcements all the time about things such as Whooping cough being a rising problem now.
 
Armadillos can give ya leprosy...
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Old Vaccine Brings India New Hope in Fight Against Leprosy
September 30, 2016 - India's decision to conduct new trials on the world’s first leprosy vaccine is eliciting hope it will help eliminate the dreaded disease from the country.
Following a declaration by the World Health Organization (WHO), India has been officially counted as a leprosy-free country since 2005, meaning less than one person in 10,000 people is afflicted with disease. Many experts, however, say the true rate of infection is much higher, accounting for more than 60 percent of the world’s new cases. Indian authorities recently announced they would soon roll out an advanced field implementation trial of the vaccine Mycobacterium Indicus Pranii, or MIP. “In the early field trials of the MIP, the vaccine’s protective efficacy was found to be quite encouraging, with 68.6 percent of people being protected for four years and 59 percent being protected for eight years. This vaccine also expedites cure rates to people already infected with the disease,” said Dr. Utpal Sengupta, a leading New Delhi-based leprosy researcher, who has worked in the field for more than four decades. “It has the ability to bolster India’s new campaign, which aims to eliminate leprosy as a public health problem by 2020.”

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Nurses are dressing а wound on leprosy patient Gopal Bag, following amputation of his leg, at the Leprosy Mission Trust India hospital, Kolkata​

Field trial to start soon

The soon-to-be-launched field trial in five high-endemic districts of Bihar and Gujarat will be administered to people with leprosy and those in close physical contact to them, in combination with the common anti-leprosy drug Rifampicin. In a statement, Dr. Soumya Swaminathan, the director-general of the Indian Council of Medical Research, which is working with the government on the rollout of the MIP trial, said the government has embarked on a “multi-pronged attack” on leprosy. He added the campaign will increase “active case detection,” saying it could be the key to eliminating the disease, “hopefully in the next five to 10 years.”

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Leprosy patient Gopal Bag, 62, sits with his amputated right leg at the Leprosy Mission Trust India hospital, Kolkata, Sept. 20 2016. Bag now has claw hands and toes as a result of the infection having gone untreated for years.​

India still hotbed

Modern medical advancements have largely diminished the impact of leprosy, mostly eliminating the disease globally but India still accounts for a majority of the world’s new cases. Pointing to the last available data released in 2013, when India had more than 135,000 new cases, experts warn that new infections are rising. In the 1980s, Indian researcher Gursaran Prasad Talwar developed the MIP vaccine at India’s National Institute of Immunology. In 2005, the results of a field trial in northern India were found to be extremely promising, but with the WHO declaring India leprosy-free that year, the MIP soon went out of focus.

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An amputated leg, claw toes and claw hands of leprosy patient Gopal Bag are seen at the Leprosy Mission Trust India hospital, Kolkata​

Infections rise after WHO declaration

Some believe the 2005 WHO declaration ended up triggering a rise in the number of new cases. “Before India was declared leprosy-free, in the country there was a dedicated system to detect the leprosy cases and provide medical care to them. But, after 2005, when the leprosy treatment was integrated into the general health care services, the process of active case search was abandoned,” said Dr. Helen Roberts, superintendent of the Leprosy Mission Trust India Hospital. “Since the designated system for leprosy virtually became dysfunctional after 2005, the cases of new infections in the country have gone up and cases remaining untreated for years, we have seen a rise in physical disabilities.”

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A worker is designing a prosthetic leg for a leprosy patient at the Leprosy Mission Trust India hospital, Kolkata​

Stigma suppressing real numbers

"Fearing stigma, which is attached to the disease, many leprosy patients maintain secrecy about their infection in India," Subhash Chandra Ghosh, who runs a leprosy care NGO in a leprosy-endemic area of West Bengal's West Midnapur district, told VOA. "They avoid visiting government-run other special leprosy care hospitals where, they fear, the information of their infection would become public. They choose to go to private clinics and fall off the radar of the health authorities," Ghosh said. "The actual number of leprosy infections in India could be in fact three or four times higher than the figures provided by the authorities. Unless the government take some solid strategic steps to uncover this hidden leprosy population, fight to eliminate leprosy will be an uphill task."

Old Vaccine Brings India New Hope in Fight Against Leprosy
 
Early Diagnosis and Treatment Can Prevent Disability from Leprosy...
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Early Diagnosis and Treatment Can Prevent Disability from Leprosy
January 28, 2018 — To mark World Leprosy Day, the World Health Organization is calling for the eradication of this ancient disfiguring disease by combating the stigma and discrimination that discourages people from seeking the help they need.
Leprosy, a hideously disfiguring disease that has blighted the lives of countless millions since Biblical days, is curable. And yet, the World Health Organization reports more than 200,000 people, most in Southeast Asia, are affected with the disease and new cases continue to arise every year. Leprosy is a chronic bacterial disease with a slow incubation period of about five years. In some cases, symptoms may occur within one year, but can take as long as 20 years to appear.

Leprosy was eliminated globally as a public health problem in 2000, but the disease persists in individuals and communities. WHO spokesman, Tarik Jasarevic, tells VOA this is unacceptable, as an effective treatment exists that can fully cure people of leprosy. “Since '95, WHO has provided this multi-drug therapy free of cost to all leprosy patients in the world," he said. "In 2016, WHO launched global leprosy strategy, 2016-2020, accelerating toward a leprosy-free world. This is basically to revamp the efforts for leprosy control. The strategy focuses on avoiding disabilities, especially among children.”

FE5A1D2B-8431-483A-9E42-382160B2B921_w650_r0_s.jpg

Nurses are dressing а wound on leprosy patient Gopal Bag, following amputation of his leg, at the Leprosy Mission Trust India hospital, Kolkata​

This year's World Leprosy Day focuses on preventing disabilities in children. WHO reports children account for nearly nine percent of all new cases of leprosy, including almost seven percent of those with visible deformities. The U.N. health agency notes early diagnosis and early treatment can prevent disability. It says disabilities do not occur overnight, but happen after a prolonged period of undiagnosed and untreated disease.

Unfortunately, it notes many people do not seek help until it is too late and deformities already have appeared. This is because of the stigma and discrimination associated with leprosy. WHO is calling for laws discriminating against people with leprosy to be abolished and replaced with policies promoting inclusion of such people within society.

Early Diagnosis and Treatment Can Prevent Disability from Leprosy
 

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