ABSTRACT
Despite India reaching elimination levelsas a public health problem, leprosy still remains a major health care problem. The aim of our study is to determine the morphological pattern and the trend of acid-fast bacilli (AFB) positivity of the disease in the post eradication phase. A retrospective study was conducted of skin biopsies clinically diagnosed as leprosy from January 2015 to December 2019. Relevant clinical history was obtained from records. Majority were in the age group of 31-40 years (20%), with male predominance (61.25%). 10.62% cases were of children below the age of 15 years. Histologically, 38.75% of cases were diagnosed as indeterminate leprosy followed by 20% cases of lepromatous leprosy. Hypopigmentation (35.62) was the most common clinical feature. Clinical-histological concordance was highest for histioid leprosy cases (100%) followed by lepromatous leprosy (90.62%). Majority of our cases were multibacillary (71.25%). BI 1+ was seen in 51.75%, whereas BI 6+ was 11.4%. Predominance of multibacillary forms specially with high bacterial load indicates late reporting and need to diagnose and treat early for stopping its transmission. Histopathological examination of skin biopsy is important for early and proper treatment of the patients with early inderminate/atypical clinical manifestations. The health care policies need to be reconsidered and revised both at the national and global levels