"Business, working with partners, can make a significant contribution to fighting Africa’s HIV pandemic" by Jeffrey L. Sturchio
When we look at progress towards MDG 6 (halting and starting to reverse the spread of HIV and AIDS by 2015), the picture is mixed. On the plus side, encouraging progress has been made on treatment and the global community is mobilising and scaling up resources to tackle this devastating pandemic. But the truth is that we have a steep hill to climb to 2015. In sub-Saharan Africa alone, an estimated 1.7 million people were newly infected with HIV in 2007, bringing to 22.5 million the total number of people living with the virus . Africa has only 10 percent of the world’s population, yet it bears nearly 70 percent of the global HIV burden –- and unless we can improve prevention efforts, the disease will continue to outpace our ability to treat those infected.
The HIV epidemic is not just a humanitarian and social issue: it also presents one of the most significant threats to Africa’s on-going economic growth and development. The pandemic tends to affect people in the prime of their economically active lives, weakening families, reinforcing poverty and depressing economic growth rates. HIV and AIDS affect business and enterprise at every level, from increased absenteeism, reduced productivity through to the loss of knowledge and essential skills.
HIV is everyone’s business. That’s why public-private partnerships have become so central to mounting an effective response to the disease. Not least for the business community, because an estimated two-thirds of people living with HIV infection work in either the formal or informal economy in Africa. This makes the epidemic a priority business issue for many companies and the workplace a key environment to tackle it. By leveraging core business activities, expertise and other resources to complement public sector activities, business is making a significant contribution to existing prevention and treatment programmes through partnerships with governments, civil society and the donor community at the national and local levels.
What more can business do? In addition to more companies adopting effective workplace programs for prevention, care, treatment and support, business can play an important role by sharing best practice and building capacity inside and outside its direct sphere of influence with customers, local communities and throughout the supply chain. For instance, Merck Sharp & Dohme, working with a team of African experts, has created a free toolkit and resource for business, “The Blueprint for Business Action on HIV / AIDS” (http://www.hiv-msd.info/Blueprint/ ), which explains how to plan and establish a workplace programme. Small and medium-sized enterprises also need to be encouraged to develop and implement workplace schemes, and this resource can help.
For the international community, looking to scale up efforts to achieve MDG 6, greater recognition should be given to the potential role that business can play in helping to achieve the goal. More needs to be done to bring the public and private sectors together to determine strategies to combine their unique skills and resources in a way that most efficiently addresses their common objective: reducing the impact of HIV. G8 countries should also find ways to encourage this kind of collaboration with companies operating in high prevalence areas; organizations like Business Action for Africa and the U. S. Corporate Council on Africa can play an important role here. The global community has the tools and the know-how to tackle the HIV epidemic effectively – we just need the will to make it happen.
Jeffrey L. Sturchio is Vice President, Corporate Responsibility, Merck & Co., Inc., and President, The Merck Company Foundation
The HIV epidemic is not just a humanitarian and social issue: it also presents one of the most significant threats to Africa’s on-going economic growth and development. The pandemic tends to affect people in the prime of their economically active lives, weakening families, reinforcing poverty and depressing economic growth rates. HIV and AIDS affect business and enterprise at every level, from increased absenteeism, reduced productivity through to the loss of knowledge and essential skills.
HIV is everyone’s business. That’s why public-private partnerships have become so central to mounting an effective response to the disease. Not least for the business community, because an estimated two-thirds of people living with HIV infection work in either the formal or informal economy in Africa. This makes the epidemic a priority business issue for many companies and the workplace a key environment to tackle it. By leveraging core business activities, expertise and other resources to complement public sector activities, business is making a significant contribution to existing prevention and treatment programmes through partnerships with governments, civil society and the donor community at the national and local levels.
What more can business do? In addition to more companies adopting effective workplace programs for prevention, care, treatment and support, business can play an important role by sharing best practice and building capacity inside and outside its direct sphere of influence with customers, local communities and throughout the supply chain. For instance, Merck Sharp & Dohme, working with a team of African experts, has created a free toolkit and resource for business, “The Blueprint for Business Action on HIV / AIDS” (http://www.hiv-msd.info/Blueprint/ ), which explains how to plan and establish a workplace programme. Small and medium-sized enterprises also need to be encouraged to develop and implement workplace schemes, and this resource can help.
For the international community, looking to scale up efforts to achieve MDG 6, greater recognition should be given to the potential role that business can play in helping to achieve the goal. More needs to be done to bring the public and private sectors together to determine strategies to combine their unique skills and resources in a way that most efficiently addresses their common objective: reducing the impact of HIV. G8 countries should also find ways to encourage this kind of collaboration with companies operating in high prevalence areas; organizations like Business Action for Africa and the U. S. Corporate Council on Africa can play an important role here. The global community has the tools and the know-how to tackle the HIV epidemic effectively – we just need the will to make it happen.
Jeffrey L. Sturchio is Vice President, Corporate Responsibility, Merck & Co., Inc., and President, The Merck Company Foundation
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