Every day, millions of people around the world
are forced to live lives apart from the rest of
society. This segregation is completely
unnecessary and only persists because of a lack
of accurate information. We want to end this
problem. Thus, for the past year, the Office
of the Special Ambassador for the Elimination
of Leprosy has been collecting donations to
both cure the rest of the world's leprosy
patients and to help societies learn to
welcome them back.

Those who care to are urged to send your donations to either of the
two accounts listed at the bottom of this page.

Voices of Humanity
"My very existence has been denied by everyone
I met." (Panama)

"To many of us, worse than the very disease is
the prejudice that comes along with it. Many of
us stopped being called Francisco, Joe, Maria,
and we started being called leprosy
patients, 'lepers' and recently Hansenites."
(Brazil)

"Even though I have been cured, I will live out
the rest of my days in this colony. Even if I
were to go home, it would be nothing but
trouble for my family." (Indonesia)

Appeal by Special Ambassador Yohei Sasakawa
Leprosy is a disease that attracts discrimination, and which
has brought suffering to humankind since before recorded history.
Those affected by the disease have not only been rejected by
society, but often by their very families as well. However, this
way of thinking no longer has a place in our society.

Leprosy is curable.

WHO's goal is the permanent elimination of leprosy as a public
health problem. The organization defines elimination as 1 person
in 10,000. I also, as WHO's Special Ambassador for the Elimination
of Leprosy, am doing what I can, working with the governments,
international organizations and NGOs to advance the effort in
countries that have yet to achieve elimination. In this way, we
have come to within the final step of eliminating this disease,
which has been with humanity since the beginning. However, even
when we have achieved elimination, we will not have completely
solved the problem.

Still today, in countless places around the
world, there are people--patients, former
patients, their families, their children--
suffering from unfounded discrimination, who
are not given their social rights. Most of them
even now do not have access to schools or
hospitals. For these people, I beg your warm
support.

Yohei Sasakawa,
WHO Special Ambassador for the
Elimination of Leprosy and
President of The Nippon Foundation,

Contacts
Queries may be sent directly to the Sasakawa Memorial Health
Foundation, which is responsible for handling all donations:

Office of the Special Ambassador for the Elimination of Leprosy
Sasakawa Memorial Health Foundation
Nippon Zaidan Building
1-2-2 Akasaka, Minato-ku, Tokyo 107-0052, Japan
Tel: +81-3-6229-5601 (or 5377)
Fax: +81-3-6229-5602

Donations
Your donations will be used for the education
and vocational training of former patients
and their children--people who have almost no
chance to gain these valuable tools on their
own.

Funds should be wired to either of the two
accounts below:

Sasakawa Memorial Health Foundation
The Sasakawa Memorial Health Foundation (SMHF) has a longer history
of supporting former leprosy patients overseas than any other
Japanese organization.

Donated funds will pass, not through The Nippon Foundation, but
through the SMHF, due to its status as a special public service
corporation. For further information about SMHF, please see the
related section on this website.


Translator: James Huffman