{"id":325576,"date":"2025-02-03T19:53:26","date_gmt":"2025-02-03T14:23:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/?p=325576"},"modified":"2025-02-03T19:53:26","modified_gmt":"2025-02-03T14:23:26","slug":"indias-approach-to-combat-leprosy-transmission","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/indias-approach-to-combat-leprosy-transmission\/","title":{"rendered":"India\u2019s Approach to Combat Leprosy Transmission"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>News: <\/strong>The Indian government has adopted a targeted approach to contain leprosy transmission in five states\u2014Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, and Odisha where the disease has the highest prevalence.<\/p>\n<h2><b>About National Strategic Plan (NSP) &amp; Roadmap for Leprosy (2023-27)<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It was launched on January 30, 2023, to achieve zero leprosy transmission by 2027, ahead of the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) timeline.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><b>The NSP includes:<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li>Year-wise targets and implementation strategies.<\/li>\n<li>Public health interventions for awareness and stigma reduction.<\/li>\n<li>Promotion of early case detection and prophylaxis (post-exposure preventive treatment).<\/li>\n<li>Nikusth 2.0: A web-based information portal for case reporting.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>About Targeted Strategy for Containment<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">India aims to curb leprosy transmission through a targeted approach in five states and 124 districts.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The five states with the highest prevalence are <\/span><b>Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, and Odisha.<\/b><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The initiative comes after achieving leprosy elimination as a public health problem at the national level in 2005 (less than 1 case per 10,000 population).<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The government has also approved a three-drug regimen for Pauci-Bacillary (PB) cases, replacing the previous two-drug regimen.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The treatment duration remains six months, aimed at stopping transmission at the subnational level by 2027.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>About\u00a0 Leprosy<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><b>Caused by: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mycobacterium leprae.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><b>Mode of Transmission:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Airborne droplets from close and frequent contact with untreated cases.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><b>Symptoms:<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Pale or reddish skin patches with loss of sensation.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Enlarged peripheral nerves leading to muscle weakness.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Microscopic detection of bacilli in skin smears.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><b>Types of Leprosy:<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Pauci-Bacillary (PB) cases (fewer bacteria).<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Multibacillary (MB) cases (more severe, higher bacterial load).<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>WHO\u2019s Support and Global Efforts<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The World Health Organization (WHO) supports India&#8217;s National Leprosy Eradication Programme (NLEP).<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">WHO provides free Multi-Drug Therapy (MDT) for leprosy treatment.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Leprosy elimination (prevalence less than 1 per 10,000 population) was achieved globally by 2000 and in most countries by 2010. However, new cases continue to emerge.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<table style=\"background-color: #f2ebeb;\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td>\n<h4><b>Declining Leprosy Cases in India<\/b><\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">India accounts for 52% of the world&#8217;s new leprosy cases.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">New case detections have significantly dropped:<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">2014-15: 1,25,785 cases.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">2021-22: 75,394 cases.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Despite overall reduction, certain districts remain endemic.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4><b>Global Leprosy Scenario<\/b><\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Leprosy is a neglected tropical disease (NTD) still affecting over 120 countries.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Around 200,000 new cases are reported globally each year.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Major contributors (2023 data):<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">India, Brazil, and Indonesia (over 10,000 new cases annually).<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">12 other countries, including Bangladesh, Myanmar, Nigeria, and Nepal, report between 1,000\u201310,000 cases annually.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>News: The Indian government has adopted a targeted approach to contain leprosy transmission in five states\u2014Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, and Odisha where the disease has the highest prevalence. About National Strategic Plan (NSP) &amp; Roadmap for Leprosy (2023-27) It was launched on January 30, 2023, to achieve zero leprosy transmission by 2027, ahead of the&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/indias-approach-to-combat-leprosy-transmission\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">India\u2019s Approach to Combat Leprosy Transmission<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10366,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1566,1738,12039],"tags":[12054,10498],"class_list":["post-325576","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily-factly-articles","category-science-and-technology-daily-factly-articles","category-knolls","tag-9pm-factly","tag-the-hindu","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325576","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10366"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=325576"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325576\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=325576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=325576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=325576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}