Chromosome 6q25 is linked to susceptibility to leprosy

Leprosy, the infectious disease known since the Bible ages, still affects an estimated 700.000 persons each year (World Health Organization. Leprosy. Global situation. Wkly. Epidemiol. Rec. 77, 1-8, 2002) and represents the first cause of peripheral neuropathy. Marcelo T. Mira and his colleagues (Chromosome 6q25 is linked to susceptibility to leprosy, Nature Genetics, advance online publication, 2003) using model-free linkage analysis, found significant evidence for a susceptibility gene on chromosome region 6q25 in a genome-wide search for loci controlling susceptibility to leprosy in a panel of 86 families including 205 siblings affected with leprosy from Southern Vietnam.

BML- April 2003