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The Documentary: Living with leprosy

Leprosy patient

17/09/2019 GMT

Living with leprosy

BBC World Service - The Documentary, Living with leprosy

Aleks Krotoski on the history of leprosy and its stigma.

When Aleks Krotoski was six years old she lived in a world surrounded by people with leprosy, or Hansen's Disease as it's officially known. Both her dad and step mum worked at the US's last leper home, the National Hansen's Disease Centre in Carville Louisiana, tucked away in a bend of the mighty Mississippi. Today she makes a return journey to find out if the stigma of leprosy still exists and how the disease is being treated.
 
From 1894 -1998 'Carville', as it was commonly known, took in patients with that most stigmatising of diseases. These shunned individuals had no choice but to come here – being diagnosed with leprosy meant that they were legally bound to sever all ties and live in medical isolation.
 
Hansen's disease remains a problem even now; one that stubbornly refuses to disappear much like the stigma it engenders. Every day sees 600 new cases across globe. A further 4 million live with the disability and disfigurement associated with the disease, many in parts of the world where the afflicted are still driven from their homes to live in shame and seclusion.  With Carville and its ghosts as a backdrop Aleks asks why since biblical times it has attracted such revulsion and fear. 
 
Whilst comparing the world of medical isolation at Carville with modern practices, Aleks contemplates what the potential for a final eradication of the disease could mean. Will it finally the wash away the stain of leprosy?

(Photo: Cured leprosy patient cleans his clawed hands in a leprosy colony in New Delhi. Credit: Getty Images)

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