Kerala - Thrissur   

`Leprosy to be eliminated by end of 2005'

By Our Staff Reporter

THRISSUR, JULY 15. Leprosy will be eliminated in the country by December 2005, according to P. K. Ummen, reconstructive surgeon and Director of the Central Leprosy Research Institute, Chengalpettu, Tamil Nadu.

Addressing a press conference here today, Dr. Ummen, along with the Central Coordinator of the Technical Committee on leprosy eradication for Kerala and Lakshadweep, P. Vijayasankar, said that 17 States had already become successful in reducing the rate of prevalence of leprosy to one person in 10,000 population; this is the criterion for declaring an area as a `leprosy-eliminated region'.

The prevalence rate of leprosy in the country is 2.44 per 10,000 persons and the total number of patients is 2.66 lakh. With concerted efforts in Orissa, Chhattisgarh, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh it should be possible to reduce the cases drastically within the next one and half year, Dr. Ummen said.

He said that most of the States had already integrated leprosy treatment with the general health care system because of the drastic reduction in the number of leprosy patients. There was no need for exclusive leprosy hospitals or for isolating leprosy patients because there was no chance of them infecting other patients, he said.

With medicines, it was now possible to cure leprosy, he said.

He said even though nearly 20 per cent of the people affected by leprosy might suffer deformities, the presence of deformed body parts does not indicate that the person is still suffering from the disease. There is no need for any stigma against such people because that was only an indication of the damage already caused by the disease and not about the persistence of the disease.

However in Kerala, leprosy treatment had not yet been integrated with the general health care system though the State had achieved the leprosy-eliminated region status.

The reason for this was reportedly the problems associated with the redeployment of staff engaged in the leprosy eradication programme, Dr. Ummen said.

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