Vitiligo is a skin condition in which the skin loses melanin, the pigment responsible for skin, hair and eye colour. As a result, irregularly shaped white patches appear on different parts of the body, sometimes including the inside of the mouth and nose and the retina of the eye. Vitiligo may cause only one or two spots or spread to whiten large areas, and hair growing on affected areas may also turn white. Vitiligo is not dangerous or contagious. The condition seems to run in families and occurs more often among people who have certain autoimmune diseases.