I actually looked that up afterwards because I thought the same thing, and the book didn't address it either way (that I recall anyway). What I found from a quick search was that it's only mildly contagious and even then only after frequent prolonged contact of months/years. I suppose that would put Matsu at risk definitely and possibly, slightly Stephen, although on the other hand Stephen could've been contagious to others with his tuberculosis as well (I kept expecting that his sister was going to get it because of her going in to see him before he left China).
It does make me wonder what the current scientific thought was, and what the societal belief was, on the contagiousness of leprosy at the time the book is set in.
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