Contagiousness of Leprosy. 271
VII. It is believed in some parts of India, especially in the
hill tracts, that those who go barefoot are liable to be directly
inoculated with leprosy through wounds or ulcers of the feet.
In one station in Burma, visited by the Commissioners, they
were informed that leprosy had spread among the members of
a school after lepers had been in the habit of walking about
the compound. As, however, an examination of some of the
supposed lepers in this school showed that several of them
were not suffering from this disease, this statement was consi-
dered open to doubt.
At Almora an opportunity occurred of examining the paths
and banks in the asylum compound, on which the lepers were
in the habit of walking and sitting. One hundred cover-glasses
were prepared from earth taken from these sites, and only ten
leprosy bacilli were found in the whole number of specimens.
But at present no criterion of a living leprosy bacillus exists,
and in any case the small number found in an extended series
of observations, on the most favourable material, would sug-
gest that the danger of individual inoculation is possible, but
that the risk of the diffusion of the disease in this manner is
very slight. On the other hand, it is noteworthy that an exa-
mination of dust from huts inhabited by lepers suffering from
the tubercular and ansthetic types of the disease, and afflict-
ed with ulcers on their feet and hands, confirmed the observa-
tion of Kaurin,16 who has not succeeded in finding bacilli in
the earth, dust or air in the rooms of lepers (Table VII).
VIII. This chapter may be concluded by stating that the
Commissioners during their enquiries met with many cases
where people, either voluntarily or for various reasons, lived in
asylums with lepers, often eating and drinking with them, or
smoking with them, perhaps attending to their wants and ail-
ments, and yet remained perfectly untainted, often after many
(16) Kaurin: Journal of the Leprosy Investigation Committee, No. 2, Feb. 1891,
page 68.