Blaine Lafreniere Outbreaks Create Isolation When living in Chicago years ago, I was involved on a philanthropic mission with the historical leper colony at Kalaupapa on the Hawaiian island of Molokai. What started out to be a single mission to support the final 90 leprosy patients in a community that for 150 years had been home to thousands of patients became a 15-year endeavor. The community is still occupied by a final few residents, even though now there is a cure for the disease and the mandatory quarantine at the isolated location at Kalaupapa was lifted in 1969. The extensive publicity and exposure of our efforts brought alarming phone calls—even death threats. At the time, there was an awful leprosy racism, and after our visits, we were targeted by individuals and groups. Some made a point to avoid me in stores and gatherings because, to them, I was "a heathen spreading a disease."