It's possible leprosy is endemic and the detected cases are a "tip of the iceberg", but I think an infectious disease doctor looked at a similar report recently

It's possible leprosy is endemic and the detected cases are a "tip of the iceberg", but I think an infectious disease doctor looked at a similar report recently and was confused why that would be assumed to be the case. Institutional knowledge on leprosy has probably been lost, and it's possible in the past that undetected infection and spread was commonly known about but not told to the public or new doctors and a current infectious disease doctor would not know about it, but I'm not sure about this situation in general.