Leprosy is a chronic infectious disease of human beings that primarily affects the skin, mucous membranes and peripheral nerves. It is a disease that has existed for thousands of years, however, the formal discovery of the leprosy bacillus Mycobacterium leprae was not until 1874. Norwegian physician Gerhard Henrik Armaeur Hansen was the first to formally identify the bacillus, and in his recognition, leprosy is also referred to Hansen's disease. Leprosy is a disease that poorly understood …showed first 75 words of 3124 total…

…showed last 75 words of 3124 total…-230. Skamene, E. (1994). Inflammatory vs protective host responses: the bcg gene story. Immunobiology, 191:451-460. van Beers, S.M., de Wit, M.Y.L., & Klatser, P.R. (1996). The epidemiology of Mycobacterium lepare: recent insight. FEMS Microbiology Letters, 136: 221-230. Weinstein, D.E., Freedman, V.H., & Kaplan, G. (1999). Molecular mechanism of nerve infection of leprosy. Trends in Microbiology, 7(5): 87-89. Web References #1 - http://who.int/lep/disease/Microbiology/transmis.htm #2 - http://www.webspawner.com/users/mlepbacillus/htm.