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Kathmandu,Wednesday January 19, 2000 Magh 5th, 2056.
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Lepers still scorned
-By a Post Reporter
MORANG, Jan 18 - A resident of Sadarbairiya
VDC in Morang district, Suresh Khadka has been cured of leprosy following a year-long
treatment.
However, he found that he is still despised
in society because public disdain for leprosy patients has not changed.
“It was natural that people tried to
keep aloof for fear of contacting the disease when I was suffering from leprosy, but even
after I have completely recovered from the disease I am still living away from the
society,” he said.
Similarly, another leprosy patient Ramesh
Bhujel complains, “The life of a leprosy patient is difficult as he continues to
suffer from discrimination even after he is cured.”
Even though some leprosy patients are
completely cured, they are so engrossed with an inferiority complex that they may still
have the remnants of the disease.
Chief of the Leprosy Diagnosis Centre Dr
Krishna Prasad Dhakal says superstition about leprosy and the lack of knowledge about the
fact that leprosy is not communicated from people who are cured are the two major
impediments in the treatment of the disease. According to Dr Dhakal, there are two types
of leprosy - communicable and non-communicable. Patients should take medicines regularly
for six months to cure non-communicable leprosy and for one year to cure communicable
leprosy.
Even if the disease is communicable, it will
cease to be so 24 hours after the patient starts taking medicines. However, the irony is
that people in our society still have the wrong notion that they may contact the disease
from a leprosy patient even when he has been completely cured, Dr Dhakal added.
Established 16 years ago with the assistance
of the Netherlands Leprosy Relief Association, the Leprosy Diagnosis Centre claims that it
has so far cured about 15 thousand leprosy patients.
The centre has been providing treatment to
about five thousand patients of the eastern Terai belt free of cost. Nearly two thousand
Indian leprosy patients come for treatment of their disease every year at the Biratnagar
based leprosy clinic, according to Dr Dhakal.
The leprosy patients of the eastern region
are undergoing treatment free of cost in hospitals of different districts, health posts
and sub-health posts in each VDC. The leprosy patients currently undergoing treatment in
different districts include 807 in Morang, 1078 in Jhapa, 523 in Sunsari, 1123 in Saptari,
852 in Siraha, 208 in Udayapur and 60 in different hilly districts.
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