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How thousands of Americans are still getting leprosy... and why you should stay away from ARMADILLOS if you want to avoid it
- Currently 6,500 cases of leprosy in the United States
- Study has found that the disease can be carried by armadillos
- 1-2 million people worldwide suffer from leprosy, which is also known as Hansen's disease
- Leprosy mostly affects the skin, but can lead to damaged nerves if left untreated
By Daily Mail
PUBLISHED:
14:19 EST, 23 July 2012
Despite being dismissed as a
mostly ancient disease, the threat of leprosy still exists in the U.S.
today, and it can be dangerous if ignored.
Commonly
referred to in the Bible, leprosy (also known as Hansen's disease) has
long been thought to have been eliminated – as effective treatments are
available.
However, the
Health Resources and Services Administration has reported that there are
currently about 6,500 cases of the disease in the U.S.
Disease: Leprosy has long been thought to have
been eliminated - as effective treatments are available, but that's not
the case in places like Madagascar, where proper medical care is scarce
While the disease can be spread
between humans through respiratory droplets, health officials warn that
some Americans can be at risk when in contact with armadillos.
Last year, a study on the
armoured mammals found that them to be the only non-human creatures that
can carry the bacteria that cause leprosy.
Armadillos
are native to mostly the southern portion of the U.S. in states like
Texas, but can also be found in states as far east as Florida.
Beware the armadillo: A
study last year found that the mammals are the only non-human creatures
that can carry the bacteria that cause leprosy
The study, conducted by Dr Richard W.
Truman and published in the New England Journal of Medicine, linked
30-40 cases of leprosy in the U.S. to armadillos.
Hardship: In the worst cases of leprosy, fingers and toes are lost and blindness can occur
Dr Truman said in a statement:
'Leprosy has been feared throughout human history, and there are still
regions in several countries, including in the southern United States,
where new cases of this disease continue to occur.’
According to the CDC, about 1-2million people worldwide have been left permanently disabled by leprosy.
Leprosy, which mainly affects the skin, is not a killer and can easily be cured today.
But
in countries where proper medical care is scarce like Madagascar,
Mozambique, Tanzania and Nepal, the disease can lead to damaged nerves
if left untreated.
Contrary
to popular belief, leprosy does not cause a patient's arms and legs to
fall off, but can cause hands and fingers to shrink.
It
typically starts as a light-coloured patch on the skin that can go
unnoticed because it causes no pain. In the worst cases, fingers and
toes are lost or blindness occurs.
The bacteria that causes the disease multiplies very slowly, with an incubation period ranging anywhere from three to 20 years.
The disease is caused by two different types of bacteria: Mycobacterium leprae and mycobacterium lepromatosis.
Chuẩn bị phong thánh nữ tu Marianne Cope
FILE
- This 1883 file photo provided by the Sisters of St. Francis of the
Neumann Communities shows Mother Marianne Cope, a nun who dedicated her
life to caring for exiled leprosy patients on Kalaupapa in Hawaii.
Mother Marianne gave her life to caring for Hawaii's leprosy patients,
outcasts that others stayed away from at the time out of fear they might
contract the disfiguring disease. On Sunday, Oct. 21, 2012, almost a
century after she died at the remote Kalaupapa leprosy settlement in
1918, the Vatican will formally recognize her as a saint. Bishop Larry
Silva of the Honolulu diocese says she's "an inspiration to us to do the
hard work, to not always do the glory work, but to roll up our sleeves
and do what needs to be done for the sake of our brothers and sisters."
Two of the seven saints to be canonized on Sunday are American women
from upstate New York: the Vatican will also canonize Kateri Tekakwitha,
a Mowhawk Indian who spent most of her life in upstate New York.
Marianne was born in Utica, N.Y. and entered the sisterhood in Syracuse.
Photo: Sisters Of St. Francis Of The Neumann Communities / AP
Hawaii, NY women to be elevated to sainthood
AUDREY McAVOY, Associated Press |
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
HONOLULU (AP) — In life, Mother Marianne Cope
was known for her strength and kindness, battling bureaucrats in Hawaii
as she led a group of fellow Franciscan nuns to care for leprosy
patients in the islands.
And since her death 100 years ago, she has been credited with helping cure two people.
On
Sunday, Mother Marianne will be declared a saint, with the Vatican
formally recognizing what her supporters have long believed in their
hearts: She is in heaven and that through her intercession two people
were miraculously cured of ailments that should have killed them.
At the ceremony presided over by Pope Benedict XVI,
the church will also canonize six others, including Kateri Tekakwitha, a
17th-century Mohawk Indian who spent most of her life in what is now
upstate New York.
Bishop Larry Silva
of the Honolulu diocese said the church canonizes people so adherents
can be inspired by their example to go to heaven and become saints
themselves.
"Our
ultimate goal is to be in heaven and we know the journey there is not
always easy. So we need role models, people who can inspire us through
by their lives to do the same," he said.
The
event comes nearly a century after Mother Marianne's 1918 death at
Kalaupapa, an isolated peninsula on Molokai Island where Hawaii
governments forcibly exiled leprosy patients for decades.
Mother
Marianne heard the call to come to Hawaii from New York state in 1883
when she was 45. She was the only religious leader in the U.S. and
Europe — of 50 asked — who agreed to a request by Hawaii's king and
queen to come to the islands to help leprosy patients.
At
the time, there was widespread fear of the disfiguring disease, which
can cause skin lesions, mangled fingers and toes and lead to blindness.
The
Hawaiian kingdom began exiling patients to Kalaupapa in 1866 to control
the disease, a policy that remained in place until a century later even
though new drugs in the 1940s made it curable.
Shortly
after her arrival from Syracuse, N.Y., she had learned that a
government-appointed administrator was abusing patients at Branch Hospital in Honolulu.
Mother
Marianne threatened to leave with the six sisters that accompanied her
unless the government removed the official. The government soon gave her
full oversight of the hospital.
She treated everyone with dignity, no matter their station in life, said Sister Davilyn Ah Chick, the principal of Our Lady of Perpetual of Help School outside Honolulu.
Mother
Marianne looked after the material well-being of patients by doing
things like planting flowers and making clothes for children born to
them. She looked after the children with particular care because the
disease prevented them from touching their own mothers and fathers.
All
the while, she was addressing the fear that some of the sisters had of
leprosy. She had them wash their hands before they took care of patients
and returned to their quarters.
"That's such a great leader who can inspire people to calm their fears and go on with their work," said Sister Patricia Burkard, past general minister of the Sisters of St. Francis of the Neumann Communities.
Mother
Marianne is being canonized after the church determined that through
her intercession, two people were miraculously cured.
Teenager Kate Mahoney's medically inexplicable recovery from multiple organ failure in 1993 paved the way for her beatification in 2005. Sharon Smith's
successful 2005 fight against an infection that tore a hole between her
intestines and stomach was the miracle needed for her to be canonized.
They
were cured after friends and family prayed to Mother Marianne. In
Smith's case, a sister pinned a bag of soil containing some of Mother
Marianne's bone fragments to her hospital gown.
Two-hundred
fifty pilgrims from Hawaii are traveling to Rome for the ceremony,
among them nine Kalaupapa patients. Although cured, a dozen people still
live at the peninsula, all older than 70.
It
will be the second trip to Rome in three years for Hawaii pilgrims.
Many made a similar trip in 2009 for the canonization of Saint Damien, a
Belgian priest who moved to Kalaupapa to care for leprosy patients in
1873 and who died of the disease 16 years later.
Silva
said Mother Marianne's life has many lessons for people today, even
though leprosy isn't a threat anymore. Her example can be applied to
other issues, such as domestic violence or homelessness.
"She
is an inspiration to us to do the hard work, to not always do the glory
work, but to roll up our sleeves and do what needs to be done for the
sake of our brothers and sisters," Silva said.
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