THE MENACE OF LEPROSY.

Hutt News, Volume 10, Issue 20, 21 October 1936, Page 2

THE MENACE OF LEPROSY.

NEW ZEAUAND NOT IMMUNE.

MAEOGtAI OUR PROTECTION,

(By A. M. Richarus, ivI.A., Dip Journ). Mussolini's lieutenants win have an enemy to subdue in "conquered" Abysinia nioro stubborn even tnan guerrilla bands —leprosy 1 By reliable accounts this terrible disease has been spreading '' like wildfire'' in the ancient empire j;or tne last few cteL-ades. it has even ueen alleged—though this is certainly a wild exaggeration—tnat now one Ethiopian in every three is a leper. Information such as this .shakes us out Oif the complacent certainty we are apt to possess that -leprosy is a conquered plague. .Actually it has spread iii the last century into many lands where it was previously unknown, into our own Pacific area. Another fallacy regarding leprosy is that it is a tropical disease.'But Abyssinia, though geographically so, is not climatically a tropical country. The last known case of leprosy in the British Isles was in the Orkneys, and leprosy still lingers not only in "warm" Italy, Portugal, Spain and Greece among European countries, but also in Germany and France, and in "icold" Russia, Norway and even Ireland. It will be news to many that there are New Zealand lepers. ( Mention of leprosy made in Egyptian, Indian and Chiuese writings from the earliest time. It was introduced into Grreece and Home ibetween 400 and 345 BjC. iby legions and traders returning from the East. In the time of Celsus 53 B.C. to 7 A.D., it was still a rare disease in Italy. But by the end of the seventh century it liad become common all over southern Europe. It was introduced into England about the year 950. The scourge was only kept within bounds throughout Europe in the middle ages by rigorous segregation. .Rulers and clergy institutud leper asylums and enacted laws for. the isolation of lepers. The ic-ontaminated live iby begging and :by the charity of the Church. 'Medical skill, capable oven of mitigating their disease did not exist. Cast out from human society, usually half-starved' and always .slowly rotting to pieces, their condition was one of iAdescriibable horror. But it was only by such drastic sodal surgery that the whole body of European Society was saved .from a like destruction. To-day leprosy exists on a comparably large scale only in Africa and India. In India there were something like 105,000 lepers in a population of 210,000,000 in 1891, i.e. one in 2000. The highest endemic rate is in Central Africa where in the Belgian Congo something like ten -per cent, are lepers. The spiead of leprosy into the Pacific began with Hawaii where the first case was noted iu 1859. It so sprea/d among the natives that 'by 1865 there were 230 known lepers in a population of 67,000. Xn New Caledonia, where it was unknown until that year (18(ia), there were 4000 lepers by ISSB. The most recent island to be attacked (1920) is Nauru where { the disease has spread with great

rapadi'ty. A spread upon a comparable scalc would be unlikely in New Zealand for leprosy is, generally speaking, a disease of semi-civilisation. .Savages are immune. The highly civilised are im mune. Yet these statements arc only generally 'true. Cases o,f leprosy do occur ever ynow and again in New Zealand from infection (contracted abroad. If they were not promptly segregated no one in the country would be safe. Until 1925 New Zealand lepers were kept in Quail Island in Lytteltoii Harbour. 'Since then they have been sent

it- Alakugai .Island ia tlio i'iji 'group alou-jj with auch cuscs us in uui Island dependencies. Of the <3SU lepers at present on the Island l'rom various iparts of ith.© south Paeilk no less than a hundred arc from New Zenland and iduipendenicies.

Makogai (the "g" is pronounceu like "ng" in "»ing," and accent is on iirst syllable) is a former cocoanut plantation which was acquired by the Fijian Government as a leper asylum i n 1911. There are five leper villages on the island each with its own dispensary. The sexes are kepi separate, and so are the nationalities as far as possible. The Medical .Superintendent appoints n headman from each village who is responsible to him lor the vlcanlincss '..if the village and (lie good behaviour of its inhabitants, in eases where the disease is in carl> si ages cure is attempted. Where it is far gone only mitigation is possible. Apart from the Superintendent and ilj. Assistant the anedical work is done

!iy twenty-six ■nurses, of-whom lilteen are white. They are nursing sisters of the lU'snan Catholic 'Church giving

Haul - live* to this tusk in response to an appel l'ioni the Fijian Covernnient. The Mission to lepers (Protest wit) ami the St. Francis' Leper Guild (Roman Catholic) care for lepers physically, mentally and spiritually throughout the wc/rld. But Makogai as the the home of our own unfortunates has a special 'claim upon the goodwill of New Zealanders of all denominations.

AVhile in its latter stages leprosy is accompanied by excruciating .pain audi disgusting symiptoius, the pain of its earlier stages is mostly mentalexile, separation .from family and l'ricm'ls, and the sense of doom.. Tokens of remembrance and sympathy from the outside world are therefore of enormous value to the inhabitants of leper stations. The Medical Superintendent of Makogai has stated that the good wishes aild gifts which New landers hava Keen making every Christmas for some years past have not only meant continued hope, courage and self-respeict for all 'hut have "in no small measure aided the cure" of many. Again as Christmas preparations .begin to be made we have the opportunity to bring literally new life to those who, in adidtion to terriible physical ill, are suffering the isolation of separation and (they fear) .forgottenness in order that we, who remain may move happily among our fellows freed from the constant dread of a terrible contamination.