01666nas a2200241   4500000000100000008004100001260001700042653002400059653003100083653001100114653002600125653001100151653001200162653001300174653001400187100001500201245009100216300001000307490000700317050003200324520105400356022001401410       2004                            d  c2004 Jan-Mar10aCongresses as Topic10aEmigration and Immigration10aEurope10aHistory, 19th Century10aHumans10aleprosy10aPolitics10aPrejudice1 aPandya S S00aThe first international leprosy conference, Berlin, 1897: the politics of segregation.  a51-700 v76  aInfolep Library - available3 a<p>The present paper examines the first attempts to internationalise the problem of leprosy, a subject hitherto overlooked by historians of imperialism and disease. The last decade of the nineteenth century saw many in the civilised countries of the imperialist West gripped by a paranoia about an invasion of leprosy via germ-laden immigrants and returning expatriates who had acquired the infection in leprosy endemic colonial possessions. Such alarmists clamoured for the adoption of vigorous leper segregation policies in such colonies. But the contagiousness of leprosy did not go unquestioned by other westerners. The convocation in Berlin of the first international meeting on leprosy revealed the interplay of differing and sometimes incompatible views about the containment of leprosy by segregation. The roles of officials from several countries, as well as the roles of five protagonists (Albert Ashmead, Jules Goldschmidt, Edvard Ehlers. Armauer Hansen, and Phineas Abraham) in the shaping of the Berlin Conference are here examined.</p>  a0254-9395