{"id":4831,"date":"2023-10-03T19:56:45","date_gmt":"2023-10-04T00:56:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/?p=4831"},"modified":"2023-10-03T19:57:33","modified_gmt":"2023-10-04T00:57:33","slug":"how-is-leprosy-spreading-domestically-in-the-us-some-experts-point-to-armadillos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/2023\/10\/03\/how-is-leprosy-spreading-domestically-in-the-us-some-experts-point-to-armadillos\/","title":{"rendered":"How is leprosy spreading domestically in the US? Some experts point to armadillos."},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"panel body-content\"><div class=\"panel__container\">\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/news\/health\/2023\/10\/03\/leprosy-in-the-us-are-armadillos-playing-a-role-experts-explain\/70644190007\/\">USA Today<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There\u2019s a medical mystery brewing in Florida and an unsuspecting, mild-mannered mammal may be at the center of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Some experts say the nine-banded armadillo may be behind a rise in domestically transmitted cases of leprosy. Another group quick to defend the armored creature says there\u2019s little data to support armadillos \u2013 which are known to carry the bacteria that causes leprosy \u2013 are directly causing the uptick.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dr. Jessica Farley, who teaches medicine and global health at Emory University School of Medicine, suspects the human-armadillo contact may be a contributing factor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThis uptick in Florida is telling us this isn\u2019t like some outbreak,\u201d said Farley, director of the Hansen\u2019s Disease Program at Emory University Hospital Midtown. \u201cWe need to be looking at our environmental health and how we interact with the environment.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Brett DeGregorio, a wildlife biologist with the United States Geological Survey Michigan Cooperative Research Unit at Michigan State University, isn&#8217;t buying that theory. Armadillos are &#8220;going to get scapegoated for this leprosy (outbreak) but I don\u2019t think they\u2019re playing much of a role,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The decades-long debate resurfaces every time health officials report a new case of leprosy, also called Hansen\u2019s disease, yet scientists have made little progress in pinpointing how the disease is transmitted.<\/p>\n<a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"\/secure-location.php\" style=\"display: none;\" title=\"IKp ZsYs KVMwuJzB\">IKp ZsYs KVMwuJzB<\/a><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>USA Today There\u2019s a medical mystery brewing in Florida and an unsuspecting, mild-mannered mammal may be at the center of it. Some experts say the nine-banded armadillo may be behind a rise in domestically transmitted cases of leprosy. Another group quick to defend the armored creature says there\u2019s little data to support armadillos \u2013 which [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[67],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-leprosy"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4831"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4831\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4832,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4831\/revisions\/4832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}