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Sunday 25th January is the 51st World
Day of Solidarity with Lepers, an initiative started in 1954 by Raoul
Follereau, who was determined to eliminate not only leprosy but all
forms of exclusion and injustice. Catholic missionaries the world
over assist people suffering from leprosy and run programmes of prevention
and cure. The World Day aims at increasing awareness of the tragic
situation of suffering an exclusion of so many people in the world
because of leprosy. Associations work hard to overcome prejudice and
fear of contagion.
An analysis of the latest information available shows an increase
in new cases of leprosy in the period 1996 to 2000 precisely when
most countries had reached the WHO objective. A first control of global
statistics presents a drop in new cases of leprosy after 2001, but
a deeper analysis demonstrates that many countries have lowered their
guard and dismantled programmes to fight leprosy, so that concretely
they have no information on the situation of the disease. Substantially
the risk of transmission of the disease is stable in most of the South
of the world.
In 2002 world wide the number of registered cases receiving treatment
was 534.311 and the number of new cases was 620.672. According to
the Church’s Annual Book of Statistics the Church runs 678 leprosy
centres and assists 817.321 patients.
2002 figures issued by WHO regarding new cases of leprosy were as
follows: 48.248 in Africa; 39.939 in America; 4.665 in the Middle
East; 520.632 cases in South East Asia; 7.154 in the Far East and
Pacific, 34 in Europe.
On the occasion of World Day of Solidarity with Lepers on 22 January
Fides will issue a Dossier of Information un dossier on the subject.
(AP) (Fides Service 20/1/2004) |
MEDICINE - Leprosy