It is a disease that often seems medieval and easy to eradicate, yet leprosy is still very present in the world, particularly in the poorest countries. According to the latest figures from the World Health Organization (WHO), approximately 215,000 new cases occurred in 2013, and a new case is diagnosed every two minutes. India, Brazil and Indonesia are the most affected countries, even if the African continent is not spared. And since 2005, the number of new annual cases has stagnated, despite efforts in the field to suppress the disease.
Leprosy is a chronic infectious disease caused by bacteria called Mycobacterium lepra or Hansel’s bacillus. It affects the skin, mucous membranes and the peripheral nervous system (nerves and ganglia outside the brain and spinal cord). It is transmitted through the respiratory tract, which makes it a particularly contagious disease.
“It’s a bacillus that continues to defy the international community,” explains Dr. Christian Johnson, medical adviser to the Raoul-Follereau Foundation against leprosy, in an interview with whydoctor. “We don’t know everything about this bacterium, even though it is a thousand years old. »
For the simplest forms of the disease, called paucibacillary, a six-month treatment is put in place. For the so-called multibacillary forms, which represent 80% of cases, the treatment must last 12 months and includes a combination of several antibiotics. But as with any use of antibiotics, the bacterial resistance is a threat that hangs over leprosy, and which could develop if the treatments are not prescribed wisely.
Mobilized this Sunday, January 25 on the occasion of Lepers’ Day, the 10,000 volunteers of the Raoul-Follereau Foundation tried to raise funds to support research and finance health clinics. The Foundation organizes the fight into three pillars: the first consists in stopping the transmission of leprosy, the second in caring for the sick, and the third lies in the fight against the exclusion of lepers.
Since the disease evolves very slowly, an infected patient can remain without symptoms and therefore without treatment for ten to fifteen years. The first signs that appear correspond to spots and then to paralysis of the extremities, which often lead toamputation members. The main objective is therefore to improve screening to prevent disabling sequelae on the one hand and to slow down contamination on the other. Because, as Dr. Francis Chaise, hand surgeon and director of the South-East Asia Leprosy Programs, reminds us, “the earlier the disease is detected, the more likely it will be to die out. »
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