Leprosy, a disease that dates back to biblical times but that has become quite rare in the modern First World, is on the rise in the U.S.
Some experts are saying one reason why is that people immigrating into the country from higher-risk regions of the world are bringing the illness with them.
Symptoms of leprosy, also known as Hansen’s disease, include “thickened skin, nodules and lesions that are reddish or lighter in color than the rest of the skin,” according to the University of Florida’s Emerging Pathogens Institute.
Leprosy also attacks the nervous system, causing “a loss of sensation that begins with tingling” before eventually becoming numbness. Disfigurement, paralysis and blindness can follow, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
How Many Have It?
Dr. Robert Schwartz, head of dermatology at Rutgers Medical School, told The Conversation this month, “Leprosy is beginning to occur regularly within parts of the southeastern United States. Most recently, Florida has seen a heightened incidence of leprosy, accounting for many of the newly diagnosed cases in the U.S.”
In August, a report in the CDC journal Emerging Infectious Diseases called the outbreak in the Southeast endemic and said “the number of reported cases has more than doubled in the southeastern states over the last decade.”
Data from the federal government’s National Hansen’s Disease Program shows that since 2013, the U.S. has seen fewer than 200 reported cases every year except 2019, when there were 216. That number dropped to 124 in 2021 before rising to 136 in 2022, the last year for which data exists.
According to the World Health Organization, some 200,000 new cases are reported each year globally from over 120 countries.
In 2019, Brazil, India and Indonesia had the most new cases with over 10,000 each, while 13 other countries (mostly in Africa and Southeast Asia) reported over 1,000.
“Around the world, as many as 2 million people are permanently disabled” as a result of leprosy, according to the CDC.
Why Is It Spreading?
Breathing in respiratory droplets from a person with leprosy is the most likely way to contract it.
Dr. Aileen Marty, infectious disease expert and professor at Florida International University, told CBS News in August that armadillos are another possible source of the disease.
But she pointed to immigration as a likely cause of the rise in leprosy seen in her state.
“There are nations in the world where leprosy is still a big problem, including places from which many immigrants come to Florida — like, for example, Mexico and India and so forth, [and] Brazil — where they have even larger problems with leprosy, and those individuals could have brought it to our community,” she said.
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Schwartz agreed, saying, “Transmission among the most vulnerable in society, including migrant and impoverished populations, remains a pressing issue.”
According to the report in Emerging Infectious Diseases, only one-third of new leprosy patients in the U.S. from 2015 to 2020 “appeared to have locally acquired the disease.”
Illegal migrants from Mexico, India and Brazil — the countries cited by Marty as having a “big problem” with leprosy — are among the most encountered at the U.S. southern border, according to Customs and Border Patrol statistics.
Since January 2021, when President Joe Biden took office and opened the nation’s border, there have been approximately 2.3 million illegal border crossers from Mexico, 147,000 from Brazil and 75,000 from India.
Is It Treatable?
Marty noted that there are effective treatments for leprosy — an antibiotic regimen that lasts a year or two — but emphasized that the disease must be caught early or symptoms can continue to progress despite treatment.
Schwartz added that “vaccine technology to combat leprosy is in the clinical trials stage and could become available in coming years.”
The CDC highlighted that leprosy does not spread easily. Furthermore, 95 percent of people are naturally immune to it.
So the rise of this biblical disease in the 21st century is something for Americans to be aware of, particularly in the Southeast, but it does not pose a significant threat to most.
