INTRODUCTION:

Leprosy, an infectious, contagious, and chronic disease, affects populations in unfavorable socioeconomic conditions. It leads to illness among both adults and children under 15 who live in the same household due to its long incubation period.

OBJECTIVES:

To investigate the occurrence and sociodemographic and clinical characteristics of leprosy cases registered among children under 15 in Pará State, Brazil.

MATERIALS AND METHODS:

Descriptive observational study with an epidemiological and ecological approach, analyzing the spatial and temporal distribution of leprosy in children under 15 in Pará, based on new cases reported and confirmed in the Notifiable Diseases Information System from January 2018 to December 2022.

RESULTS:

A total of 929 new cases of leprosy were diagnosed in the study group. Of these, 53.61% were male, 72.23% were aged between 10 and 14 years, 78.58% were brown, 43.92% had completed grades 5 to 8 of elementary school, and 74.81% lived in urban areas. The detection rate was highest in 2018 (12.74 new cases per 100,000 inhabitants), followed by a decreasing trend in subsequent years.

CONCLUSION:

A decrease in leprosy cases among children under 15 was observed from 2018 to 2022, likely due to underreporting associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. Nevertheless, the data showed gaps in health service coverage, indicating that leprosy among children and adolescents in Pará persists.