There’s 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’s little data to support armadillos – which are known to carry the bacteria that causes leprosy – are directly causing the uptick.
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.
“This uptick in Florida is telling us this isn’t like some outbreak,” said Farley, director of the Hansen’s Disease Program at Emory University Hospital Midtown. “We need to be looking at our environmental health and how we interact with the environment.”
Brett DeGregorio, a wildlife biologist with the United States Geological Survey Michigan Cooperative Research Unit at Michigan State University, isn’t buying that theory. Armadillos are “going to get scapegoated for this leprosy (outbreak) but I don’t think they’re playing much of a role,” he said.
The decades-long debate resurfaces every time health officials report a new case of leprosy, also called Hansen’s disease, yet scientists have made little progress in pinpointing how the disease is transmitted.