The Archives preserve and protect rare volumes of journals, text books and other reference materials on leprosy.

The  documents are testimony to the struggle of controlling leprosy from the establishment of  the Culion Leper Colony in 1906 down to its transformation to a General Hospital in 2009. The documents provide all traces of segregation of the patients and the efforts of maintaining their own community until WHO declared the elimination of leprosy as a public health problem in 1998.

The Culion Sanitarium was one of the first in Asia which had a successful model of leprosy treatment facilities. The documents are of great significance, as a unique collection of primary sources on the history of one of the most important leprosariums in the Asia/Pacific region. One can learn from these diverse resources the history of the formation of the colony in 1906, the management up to its closure in the early 21st century.  The final document in the collection is from 2015.

The books and archival resources show the global and regional connections between Culion and other leprosy organizations. Their coordination reflects the global medical efforts at containing the disease and finding the cure for it in the end. The effort at maintaining the dignity of those afflicted deserves to be remembered before it is forgotten.

Nomination Form

.

Principal documentary source of Philippine history for the American colonial period 1898-1946.