Nutrition And Leprosy

In this paper we briefly review some of our recent work on the nutritional aspects of leprosy, and also draw attention to related contributions of other sci· entists in India and abroad. Foster et a/4 had recently reviewed the available literature. on nutrition-Iepro~y inter-relationship (145 references). Despite much suggestive evidence of the supportive contributory role of good nutrition towards better prognosis and management of leprosy, the precise role of specific nutrients in the pathogenesis of leprosy is still not clear. This is an area hitherto somewhat neglected which merits serious attention from nutrition scientists and leprologists. We hope that this brief report will stimulate further interest in this area.