Management of the HIV epidemic in Nicaragua: the need to improve information systems and access to affordable diagnostics

Several factors limited HIV transmission during the 1980s, includ-ing a ten-year civil war accompanied by an economic blockade by the United States of America (USA), which isolated the country for several years; a relatively controlled commercial sex industry; low infection rates for injecting drug users; and a ban on the commercial sale of blood. In the late 1990s, however, the spread of HIV rapidly increased.