Nan McCurdy, April 9th 2020
https://afgj.org/nicanotes-personal-experience-with-nicaraguas-covid-19…
On March 31 my husband and I traveled from Mexico City to Managua. In the Nicaragua airport all passengers were tested for temperature – this is a measure taken by the Sandinista government since another epidemic in 2009.
These checks are also done at all the border crossings. Trained Health Ministry staff met for more than ten minutes with each passenger asking about any symptoms, if you have been near anyone with Covid-19, etc. Our address and phone number in Nicaragua were requested multiple times. They explained to us the importance of maintaining a fourteen-day quarantine at home, and that others with you should do the same.
They emphasized we should leave everything including our clothes outside the home for three days in the sun. Since then an epidemiologist has called every other day. This is a great example of how Nicaragua keeps the virus from entering the population.
The emphasis of the free public health system is community-based prevention; instead of waiting until people are sick, it works to prevent illness and to prevent the spread of illness. For example, Nicaragua has nearly 100% vaccination rates for children 0 to 6, and pregnant mothers, and does educational campaigns for prevention like the current one where health staff and trained volunteer health workers visited more than two million three hundred thousand families to educate for prevention of Covid-19.