Update on Leprosy cases in the country

The Government of India has launched National Strategic Plan (NSP) & Roadmap for Leprosy (2023-27) on 30^th January, 2023, to achieve zero transmission of leprosy by 2027 i.e. three years ahead of the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3.3. The NSP and Roadmap contains implementation strategies, year-wise targets, public health approaches and overall technical guidance for the programme. The strategy and roadmap focuses on awareness for zero stigma & discrimination, promotion of early case detection, prevention of disease transmission by prophylaxis (Leprosy Post Exposure Prophylaxis) and roll out of web-based information portal (Nikusth 2.0) for reporting of leprosy cases.

After achieving elimination status at national level, National Leprosy Eradication Programme (NLEP) has taken a number of initiatives to encourage early case detection of leprosy patients to prevent Grade 2 Disabilities, and to ensure free of cost treatment of leprosy patients. There are few districts within States/UTs, where leprosy is endemic. With various intervention introduced under NLEP in the last few years, number of new leprosy cases detected have come down to 75,394 in 2021-22 from 1,25,785 in 2014-15, accounting for 53.6% of global new leprosy cases. The current NLEP State-wise data is annexed.

India has achieved the elimination of leprosy as a public health problem as per WHO criteria of less than 1 case per 10,000 population at the National level in 2005.

State wise NLEP data FY 2022-23 (up to Jan’2023)

 

S.No.	State/UT	Prevalence Rate (PR)/ 10000 population
1	Andhra Pradesh	0.5
2	Arunachal Pradesh	0.1
3	Assam	0.2
4	Bihar	0.9
5	Chhattisgarh	2.3
6	Goa	0.2
7	Gujarat	0.4
8	Haryana	0.1
9	Himachal Pradesh	0.2
10	10 Jharkhand	1.4
11	11 Jammu & Kashmir	0.1
12	Karnataka	0.3
13	Kerala	0.1
2314	14 Madhya Pradesh	0.9
15	15 Maharashtra	1.2
16	16 Manipur	0.1
17	17 Meghalaya	0.0
18	18 Mizoram	0.1
19	19 Nagaland	0.1
20	20 Odisha	1.2
21	21 Punjab	0.2
22	22 Rajasthan	0.1
23	23 Sikkim	0.2
24	24 Tamil Nadu	0.3
25	25 Telangana	0.7
26	26 Tripura	0.0
27	27 Uttar Pradesh	0.4
28	28 Uttarakhand	0.3
29	29 West Bengal	0.5
30	30 A & N Islands	0.1
31	31 Chandigarh	1.4
32	32 D & N Haveli	1.0
33	33 Daman & Diu	0.1
34	34 Delhi	0.8
35	35 Lakshadweep	0.0
36	36 Ladakh	0.3
37	37 Puducherry	0.1

The Union Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare, Dr. Bharati Pravin Pawar stated this in a written reply in the Rajya Sabha today.

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MV

HFW/ Update on leprosy cases in the country /21 March 2023/5