National HIV/AIDS Strategy 2011-2016: Nepal

HIV in Nepal is characterized as concentrated epidemic. More than 80 percent HIV infections spread through heterosexual transmission. People who inject drugs, female sex workers (FSWs) and men having sex with other men (MSM) are the key populations at higher risk spreading the epidemic. Male labour migrants (particularly to HIV prevalence areas in India, where labour migrants often visit female sex workers) and clients of female sex workers in Nepal are acting as bridging populations that transmit infections from higher risk groups to lower risk general population. As the epidemic is maturing (after the first HIV case reported in 1988), increased number of infections are being recorded among low risk general men and women. However, the epidemic has never maintained
through heterosexual transmission in the general population in Nepal, rather driven by the infections among higher risk populations and their sexual partners.