Nicaragua

Nicaragua is one of the poorest countries in Latin America. Over the past 40 years, it has had to overcome a cruel dictatorship, a bloody civil war and many natural disasters.

• 80% of its population lives on less than $2 per day
• 44% of the population lives in rural areas and has poor access to health care services, water, sanitation and education

The North Atlantic Autonomous Region in the north-east of the country, where our work is based, has a large indigenous population that has historically been marginalised by the central government.

The region has some of the highest rates of basic unsatisfied needs, such as inadequate housing, poor water supply, overcrowding and low education levels in the country.

Health Poverty Action work in this region includes:

Developing safer and culturally appropriate maternity services
We are helping to reduce maternal mortality among indigenous populations of the North Atlantic Autonomous Region through training Traditional Birth Attendants, refurbishing health facilities and running a communications campaign to raise awareness of the issues.
 
Improving educational chances
We are reducing violence in schools to help young people achieve their potential. A number of children and young people were identified as victims of violence during our previous project on sexual health, so we are increasing knowledge of violence against children through training children, parents and teachers, and providing regular radio broadcasts to combat it.

HIV education
We are helping to prevent HIV among young people through promoting awareness of risky behaviour, and prevention through distributing condoms and encouraging community wide discussions.