Petaling Jaya, Malaysia - The leprosy settlement here will soon be gazetted as a national heritage site in March.

It would be a Chinese New Year gift for the former lepers living at the Sungai Buloh leprosarium when the settlement is gazetted as a national heritage.

Health Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai said the gazetting of the 78ha Sungai Buloh settlement would be done by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak.

"The National Heritage Depart­ment had a meeting with my ministry last week and we are in the process of getting it gazetted," he said after distributing ang pow to leprosy patients and former patients yesterday.

There are 121 leprosy patients in the leprosy control ward and 111 former patients currently living in the area, he said.

From the time the settlement was developed in 1930, Sungai Buloh was one of the biggest leprosy settlements in the then-British Empire, and the second biggest in the world.

In recent years, the original 230ha leprosy settlement has been subdivided and the Sungai Buloh Hospital and medical faculty of Universiti Teknologi Mara were built on the land.

-- The Star/Asia News Network