My name is Alex Kratoski. I grew up in southern Louisiana where my dad and step-mum worked at

Carville, the National Hanson's Disease Center.

Growing up there, I wasn't aware of the superstitions in the midst that surrounded Hansen's disease because in many ways, I'd forgotten its more common name.

You probably won't know Hansen's disease,

but you will have heard of leprosy.

The reason why Carville happened

was because leprosy was found in New Orleans.

For the BBC World Service, I'm returning to Carville to speak with the people still living with leprosy.

I want to know why Hansen's disease is so misunderstood and why leprosy is so

feared in today's world. As a state, we were still very isolated,developed under educated those are all elements to

develop a really superstitious kind of myth-based reaction to something like leprosy.

And the first reaction was almost always to lean away from me in the seat

while they're still looking at me,

and then you'll see this kind of light go on in their head, and they lean back toward me again and they say,

but I didn't think that existed anymore.

Leprosy is a disease with a long history and it's usually talked about out of context often when somebody wants to

describe something is absolutely terrifying. But the reality of Hansen's

disease is something very different. When the patient is diagnosed somewhere, it could be a child in a school, someone entering a nursing

home, someone in prison.

And I've had all those examples I can think of in my mind have happened and people go nuts.

So we're currently driving along River Road, so on my right is a big beautiful slope of the green grassy levee on the other side is of course the Mississippi River.

On my left is ubiquitous Louisiana power plant.

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