Guidelines for carrying out leprosy elimination campaigns 1996

A Leprosy Elimination Campaign (LEC) is an initiative which aims to detect leprosy cases, particularly the more serious ones referred to as 'cases of consequence', that remain undetected in the community, and to treat them with MDT. This will subsequently reduce the delay in managing such cases in the community and ensure that the existing health services are able to treat them. It is a time-bound, one-time activity. Leprosy of consequence is defined as cases with more than five skin lesions and skin smear positive cases. Such cases are regarded as being of consequence because they act as a major source of infection in the community and are either already disabled or at high risk of becoming disabled. LEC is a focused combination of activities which includes: orientation courses for local health workers and volunteers; community awareness creation activities; case-finding and treating every detected case immediately with MDT. These campaigns are to be carried out primarily in endemic regions where the prevalence and new case detections are high and where the gap between estimated and registered cases is large. It is a national activity, implemented by the national staff with technical cooperation from WHO and other agencies.