A LONG WAY TO GO

Recently, there are still more than 1,600 leprosy cases to be newly detected, 160 cured leprosy cases to relapse and more than 6,300 active cases to be treated each year in the country. In addtion, about 100,000 cured cases with leprosy-related disabilities in leprosy villages or communities are faced with difficulties in medical care, rehabilitation and life security. While the epidemic situation of leprosy keeps stable at national level, the local situation in some areas has not yet improved a lot and even showed an increasing trend. It is clear that leprosy will continue to exist in China for many years, and there is still a gap to achieve the target of leprosy elimination at county level which is defined as a prevalence of lower than 0.1/10,000. Leprosy control in China has a long way to go and the Center has to make its more efforts for leprosy elimination in China.