Key points
- Neglected tropical diseases affect about 1 billion people, and 1.4 billion people required NTD interventions in 2024 — down 36% from 2.19 billion in 2010 (WHO, road map progress report, January 2026).
- Leprosy: 172,717 newly detected cases in 2024, across 188 countries and territories reporting; 55 reported zero new cases. Jordan was the first country verified for leprosy elimination, in 2024 (WHO).
- Scabies is a skin neglected tropical disease that spreads in crowded settings. A WHO-led survey in May 2023 found about 39% of Rohingya refugees in Cox's Bazar camps affected; after mass drug administration, prevalence fell to 19.2% (March 2025).
- Scabies and leprosy are not the only skin neglected tropical diseases — Buruli ulcer, yaws, leishmaniasis, lymphatic filariasis, mycetoma and onchocerciasis also show on the skin.
Direct answer: Some skin conditions affect whole communities, not just individuals — and two of them, scabies and leprosy, are neglected tropical diseases that show on the skin. Neglected tropical diseases affect about 1 billion people, and 1.4 billion people required interventions for them in 2024 (WHO, road map progress report, January 2026). This page explains scabies and leprosy at population level, names the other skin neglected tropical diseases, and says why stigma — not the conditions themselves — is often the heaviest burden. It is awareness only: no diagnosis, no treatment detail, no personal advice.
Why skin conditions are a community issue
Most skin conditions are individual: one person’s acne, one person’s eczema. Scabies and leprosy are different. They spread or persist through the conditions people live in — crowding, displacement, poverty, and health systems that do not reach everyone. That is why they are public health topics, not only dermatology topics, and why WHO groups them with the neglected tropical diseases (NTDs): diseases that affect about 1 billion people, mostly in poor and marginalised communities, and that receive far less attention than their burden warrants. In 2024, 1.4 billion people required NTD interventions — down 36% from 2.19 billion in 2010, which is real progress, and still a very large number.
Scabies
Scabies is a skin neglected tropical disease: it causes intense itching and a rash, and it spreads in crowded settings — households, camps, institutions where people live close together. The clearest recent picture comes from the Rohingya refugee camps at Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh: a WHO-led survey in May 2023 found about 39% of refugees affected, and after mass drug administration between November 2023 and February 2024 covering about a million people, a follow-up survey in March 2025 found prevalence had fallen to 19.2%. The numbers show two things at once: how fast scabies spreads where people are crowded, and how much a community-wide response can bring it down. This page does not describe scabies treatment — that is clinical detail, and it is not repeated here.
Leprosy
Leprosy, also called Hansen’s disease, is a skin neglected tropical disease. WHO counted 172,717 newly detected cases in 2024, across 188 countries and territories reporting; 55 reported zero new cases. Jordan was the first country verified for leprosy elimination, in 2024. Leprosy is curable with multidrug therapy (MDT), according to WHO’s leprosy fact sheet (published 23 January 2026) — a point the research behind this page verified against the WHO page itself. The case count is published yearly by WHO, and it moves slowly — leprosy is a disease of years, not weeks, and the count is a record of detection as much as of spread. What this page does not do is describe what leprosy looks like on an individual or how it is treated beyond that one fact; those are clinical matters, and the research behind this page deliberately did not answer them from secondary sources.
Other skin neglected tropical diseases
Scabies and leprosy are the two this page covers in detail, but they are not the only skin NTDs. The full set that shows on the skin includes Buruli ulcer, yaws, leishmaniasis, lymphatic filariasis, mycetoma and onchocerciasis — named here so that a reader meeting any of them knows they belong to the same group: neglected tropical diseases with skin signs, recognised by WHO through its skin-NTD training guide and app. No figures are stated for them here, because none were verified in the research behind this page. The point of naming them is completeness: a page about community skin conditions that mentioned only scabies and leprosy would leave the impression that the set ends there, and it does not.
Stigma, and why it matters most
For leprosy in particular, stigma has historically been heavier than the disease itself: separation from family and community, loss of work, and laws that excluded people — a history the general stigma guide on this site covers in its terms of public, self and structural stigma. The same three types act on scabies, where the wrong idea is that it is a sign of dirtiness rather than of crowding. In both cases the stigma does public health harm of its own: it delays people seeking care, it hides cases, and it makes community responses harder. The companion guide on living with a visible skin condition covers that burden in full, and this page points to it rather than repeating it.
Frequently asked questions
What is scabies, and how does it spread?
Scabies is a skin neglected tropical disease that causes intense itching and a rash, and spreads in crowded settings. It is a community condition, not a personal failing.
What is leprosy?
Leprosy, also called Hansen's disease, is a skin neglected tropical disease. WHO counted 172,717 newly detected cases in 2024, across 188 countries and territories.
Is leprosy still a problem anywhere?
Yes — 172,717 new cases were detected in 2024. At the same time, 55 countries and territories reported zero new cases, and Jordan was verified for elimination in 2024.