Haunted by Stigma: Living with Hansen’s Disease in the Brazilian Amazon

Hansen’s disease (HD), historically labeled “leprosy,” persists as a public-health and social-justice concern despite the availability of curative multidrug therapy (MDT). Drawing on 55 semi-structured interviews and extensive participant observation in Vila Santo Antônio do Prata, Pará (2017-2023), this article interrogates how stigma continues to shape the biographies, spatial practices, and mental well-being of individuals who have experienced HD. Anchored in medical anthropology, critical phenomenology, and social-suffering frameworks, the analysis reveals three interlocking domains of harm: (1) ontological insecurity generated by enduring the label of “cursed”; (2) social death mediated through forced spatial marginalization; and (3) embodied hauntologies that reproduce colonial and religious imaginaries. The findings underscore the necessity of integrated interventions that combine biomedical cure with culturally grounded psychosocial support and community-level stigma reduction.