The World Health Organization WHO says it will send leprosy drugs to Nigeria after resolving testing hold-ups that contributed to a year-long delay in thousands of patients, including children, getting the medicine they need to prevent irreversible disability.

Nigeria reports over 1,000 cases of leprosy yearly, a disease caused by a bacterium, Mycobacterium leprae, and mainly affecting the skin, peripheral nerves, and eyes. It is curable with multi-drug therapy, but without treatment, the disease progresses and causes disfiguring sores and disabilities like blindness and paralysis. Patients also face significant stigma.

At ERCC Hospital in Nasarawa state, 200 km (124 miles) west of the capital Abuja, only two leprosy patients were admitted when Reuters visited in February, after 26 others had been sent home since last year due to the shortage, raising the risk of spreading the infectious disease, which is thought to spread through respiratory droplets and prolonged contact.

Reuters