History of leprosy

Common card · No. 250339

The history of leprosy was traced to its origins by an international team of 22 geneticists using comparative genomics of the worldwide distribution of Mycobacterium leprae. Monot et al. (2005) determined that leprosy originated in East Africa or the Near East and traveled with humans along their migration routes, including those of trade in goods and slaves. The four strains of M. leprae are based in specific geographic regions where each predominantly occurs: Strain 1 – East Africa, Asia, and the Pacific region Strain 2 – Ethiopia, Malawi, Nepal/North India, and New Caledonia Strain 3 – Europe, North Africa, and the Americas; and Strain 4 – West Africa and the Caribbean. They created a map of the dissemination of leprosy in the world. This confirmed the spread of the disease along the migration, colonisation, and slave trade routes taken from East Africa to India, West Africa to the New World, and from Africa into Europe and vice versa. In 1873 G.H. Armauer Hansen in Norway discovered...

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