LEPERS.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 4 February 1927, Page 8

LEPERS.

CALCUTTA STIRRED

TERRIBLE SIGHTS IN STREETS.

CALCUTTA, Jan. 31

Public opinion in Calcutta is again having one of its periodical rebellions against the dreadful spectacle of disease, in all its hideousness, which. is presented in the streets. The citv has for long had an unenviable reputation <n, being the happy hunting-ground for leprous, and other b--ggars, who come from all parts of India on the occasion of the big religious festival. The parade of stricken individuals so affected by disease as to become almost travesties' of human beings baffles description. A leading Calcutta doctor said yesberdav that the Corporation of Calcutta and the Government of Bengal maintain expensive health departments, which undoubtedly do much to safeguard people, but not one yet has come forward with sufficient energy to effect tire protection of the city from what might be perhaps, the. most terrible scourge* in the world. The scheme for the establishment of a leper institution up country has been held up hy difficulties of a water supply The number of lepers in Calcutta is 120, in Howrah 40, and in its suburbs 30. These figures probably are underestimates.