Leprosy is caused by people not having clean water to clean themselves with

When I was in India in Bihar State where Bodhgaya is where the Buddha sat under the Bodhi Tree (there is still a relative of this tree (several) living there still today by the way), my family and I went to a Holy Cave where Yogis meditated nearby on a special day with a Tibetan Buddhist Lama we were traveling with then in 1985 just after Christmas.

What I was blown away by was that there were literally whole families of Lepers (thousands of them) gathered on the road and trail to this Holy Cave of ancient and more recent yogis.

Then the Tibetan lama bought a package of 1 thousand small candies from a vendor there and proceeded to give each leper (man, woman and child) a small piece of candy.

Since all these lepers were begging for food they happily received this piece of candy from an obvious Holy Man.

What I was thinking at the time was: "What kind of an effect on homeless people who haven't eaten recently or had any water for awhile would a a piece of candy have upon them? Would this be a good thing or just space them out?" I'm not sure the answer because each person likely had a different metabolism.

But, most of these people had missing fingers, toes and noses from leprosy as it eats away the fingers and the noses and toes of people first as it eats them away until they die.

Did I get a type of PTSD from this experience? Not sure. But, I was very different after 4 months in India and Nepal after seeing so many people dead or with leprosy or chasing after me and my family begging for money or food screaming "Baksheesh!" which means something like "Share your wealth" or "Help me" or something like this.

I tried to give everyone from a penny to a nickel to a dime at least while there simply because these people needed respect and recognition that they were still people in order to stay alive one more day.

I saw all homeless people on earth much differently after visiting India because about half the people in India had no education at all then. So, homelessness in some ways was the dominant paradigm then in 1985 and 1986 while I and my family were there. However, I'm told it is now very different in India than then.