366 The Philippine Journal of Science 1916 
authorities in Manila that he would send a shipload of Japanese 
for them to experiment upon and endeavor to convert. The 
good padres were highly delighted, but their pleasure was turned 
to distress when it was found upon the arrival of the ship in 
1633 that the new recruits consisted of 150 lepers. They were 
permitted to land, but no attempt at segregation was made, and 
so these people scattered throughout the Islands, spreading in- 
fection wherever they located. According to estimates made 
by the Franciscan fathers, there were at one time 30,000 lepers 
in the Archipelago. This number was probably greatly exag- 
gerated, as in 1902 the Bureau of Health began making a sys- 
tematic census of known lepers and reported an estimate of 
10,000, probably much less. 
During the Spanish régime all leper hospitals were conducted 
by the church. No very definite policy seems to have been 
followed. The first leper hospital in Manila was established 
in 1633 by the Franciscan order as a separate department of 
their general hospital and was located across the street from the 
present United States Army Department Hospital. Lepers were 
here cared for except, for an indefinite period, between 1662 
and 1681. At this time Chinese pirates threatened an invasion 
of Manila, and the patients were moved to Quiapo for safety. 
In 1784 the church authorities deemed it best to move from 
Calle Concepcion, and the Government gave them the present 
San Lazaro estate with the proviso that a portion was to be 
used for the location of a hospital and the bulk of the estate 
rented and the money so obtained devoted to maintenance. 
Portions of the original structure are still standing and are, I 
believe, in use as the leper department of the present San Lazaro 
Hospital. 
In 1859 Pedro Felix Huertas took charge of the hospital; he 
seems to have been a very excellent executive and to have made 
many improvements. The stone walls, which exist to-day, were 
built by him at a cost of 30,000 pesos.’ 
At the time of the American occupation there were three 
hospitals devoted to the care of lepers: namely, the San Lazaro 
in Manila, one in Cebu, and another in Ambos Camarines, the 
total capacity of the three being estimated at 400. 
In the report of the former Board of Health (now Bureau of 
Health) for 1902 mention is made of the necessity for establish- 
ing a leper colony. A committee appointed by the military 
2One peso Philippine currency equals 100 centavos, equals 50 cents 
United States currency. 
