PUTRAJAYA, Jan 30 — Malaysia recorded a 15.5 per cent increase in new leprosy cases in 2022, with 164 cases compared to 142 in 2021, said Health Minister Dr Zaliha Mustafa.In conjunction with yesterday’s 2023 World Leprosy Day themed “Act Now: End Leprosy”, Dr Zaliha said in a statement that the increase was a result of active detection in endemic localities carried out by health personnel at the district level.
“One of them is community skin screening through active case detection while close contacts are also identified and screened at the clinics according to existing guidelines,” she said. She said at-risk communities such as close contacts and individuals living in endemic localities should head to the clinic immediately when they begin to show early signs of the disease, which are white or copper-red spots on the skin that are not itchy.
Leprosy is one of the oldest infectious diseases besides chronic tuberculosis and can infect close contacts when droplets containing the bacteria ‘Mycobacterium leprae’ are released when the untreated patient coughs or sneezes.
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