Epidemiology of leprosy

[5] In 2000, the World Health Organization (WHO) listed 91 countries in which Hansen's disease is endemic.

[8] Although the number of cases worldwide continues to fall, pockets of high prevalence continue in certain areas such as Brazil, South Asia (India, Nepal), some parts of Africa (Tanzania, Madagascar, Mozambique) and the western Pacific.

At highest risk are those living in endemic areas with poor conditions such as inadequate bedding, contaminated water and insufficient diet, or other diseases (such as HIV) that compromise immune function.

[9] The region of DNA responsible for this variability is also involved in Parkinson disease,[10] giving rise to current speculation that the two disorders may be linked in some way at the biochemical level.

[citation needed] Endemic countries also report the number of new cases with established disabilities at the time of detection, as an indicator of the backlog prevalence.

Determination of the time of onset of the disease is generally unreliable, is very labor-intensive and is seldom done in recording these statistics.

As reported to WHO by 115 countries and territories in 2006, and published in the Weekly Epidemiological Record, the global registered prevalence of leprosy at the beginning of the year was 219,826 cases.

[citation needed] Table 2 shows the leprosy situation in the four major countries that have yet to achieve the goal of elimination at the national level.

Congo officially reported to WHO in 2008 that it had reached elimination by the end of 2007 at the national level.

[16] The People's Republic of China has many leprosy recovered patients who have been isolated from the rest of society.

Although leprosy is now curable with the advent of the multi-drug treatment, the villagers remain because they have been stigmatized by the outside world.

[17] Health NGOs such as Joy in Action have arisen in China to especially focus on improving the conditions of "Recovered Villages".

[18] British India enacted the Leprosy Act of 1898 which institutionalized those affected and segregated them by sex to prevent reproduction.

India has estimated three million people with disability or health issues stemming from leprosy.

India announced that leprosy had been “eliminated as a public health problem,” meaning that there would be fewer than one new case per 10,000 people (as defined by the WHO).

[20][21] Malaysia was announced to be eliminated of leprosy by WHO in 1994, which signifies a reduction in the prevalence rate of the disease to less than 1 case per 10,000 people.

However, it was reported that there is a rise in incidence across the country over recent years, reaching 1.02 cases per 10,000 people in 2014.

[28] The first documented case of leprosy (erga corpore morbi leprae) in Malta in a Gozitan woman (Garita Xejbais) was in 1492 but it is certain that it was present on the island before this time.

The project was based on the work of Enno Freerksen, Director of the Borsal Institute in Hamburg.

Catholic nuns (the religieuses hospitalières de Saint-Joseph, RHSJ) came to take care of the sick.

In a century of existence, it had housed not only Acadian victims of the disease, but people from all over Canada as well as sick immigrants from Iceland, Russia and China, among other nations.

Mexico (18.3%), Micronesia (11.5%), Brazil (9.2%), and the Philippines (7.6%) were the next leading countries where those with the disease were originally born.

[33] In 2018 there are about 5,000 people who no longer have leprosy but have long-term complications of disease and continue to receive care.