Growth rate of leprosy cases gets stable across Kolhapur

KOLHAPUR: The growth rate of leprosy cases has stabilised and the health authorities are aiming for total eradication of the disease from the district.
At present, around 15 to 20 cases are detected every month. The annual rate of detection of new cases rate is 1.62%, which is much lesser than the state average of 13.24%. The incidence of leprosy cases with deformity has come down to zero.
Health authorities said the rate of detection of new cases is slowly declining. The authorities are going to start a campaign to detect the active leprosy patients from September 13 through a door-to-door campaign.
Harshala Vedak, assistant director of National Leprosy Eradication Program, said, “The count of active cases of leprosy is 137 for the current year, which is slightly little higher than last year. The district is taking steps towards total leprosy eradication. We have no stigmatisation of the leprosy patients. Early detection is key to reduce the cases.”
Vedak added that around 68% cases are of multibaccillary (MB) leprosy, which is contagious. “We have managed to stop the transmission by putting the immediate family members on Rifampicin, a potentially effective drug against leprosy.”
The two years of Covid pandemic had slowed down detection of the leprosy patients. The campaign starting from September 13 will be the first massive scale campaign to find leprosy patients after the gap of two years.
Along with leprosy patients, tuberculosis patients too will be detected. The accredited social health activists (ASHA) workers will be deployed to accomplish the task. Awareness campaigns will also be organised on the sidelines.
“The patients should come forward if they find any of the symptoms related to leprosy. The treatment is available at all health centres both in urban areas and rural areas. We have set the target to bring the prevalence rate further to 0.2% in next three years,” said Vedak.