Looking for a Full Sports Calendar? Try Nicaragua

Nicaragua has not closed its borders and is the only country in Central America that has not declared a state of emergency. As nations around the world locked down, Nicaragua announced it would not enact a quarantine, and Ortega’s wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, called for large public marches across the country under the slogan “Love in the Time of Covid-19.”

As of Monday, the authorities in Nicaragua, the poorest country in Central America, had reported only one death and just nine confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus — all imported from abroad. They have also said that their efforts, like follow-up phone calls with recently arrived travelers or campaigns to promote hygiene, have been successful.

“We don’t have local community transmission, infinite thanks to God,” Murillo said during a speech on Thursday.

Still, Nayib Bukele, the president of El Salvador, which had 137 confirmed cases as of Monday, has publicly questioned the veracity of Nicaragua’s low numbers and suggested that the country’s insufficient measures could make the outbreak worse in the region. Nicaragua’s neighbors, Costa Rica and Honduras, have nearly 1,000 cases and 30 deaths combined, according to the World Health Organization.

Dr. Carissa F. Etienne, the director of the Pan American Health Organization, said last week that her institution was concerned about a litany of problems in Nicaragua — from mass gatherings to the testing itself — and “what we see as inadequate infection prevention and control.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/14/sports/coronavirus-nicaragua-sports-events.html