Freedom, justice, and neglected tropical diseases.

Neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) are remediable injustices of our times. Poverty is the starting point, and the ultimate outcome, of NTDs. Much about poverty is evident enough, but considering poverty as simply low income is insufficient [2]. In the context of NTDs, poverty should be seen as the relative deprivation of freedoms and capabilities dictating a lack of opportunities and choices in life [3], [4]. Capabilities refer to the person's freedom to lead one type of life or another, and freedom with the real opportunity to accomplish what we value as human beings [5]. Thus, NTDs are diseases of socially excluded populations that promote poverty by relatively depriving individuals from basic capabilities and freedoms. The social pathways of becoming ill with an NTD include socially determined failures including widespread illiteracy, malnutrition, poor living conditions, unemployment, and the overall failure of ownership relations in the form of entitlements [2], [5]. In turn, in a vicious cycle of destitution and dispossession, NTDs produce disability, disfigurement, stigma, and premature mortality.