Report on the Global HIV/AIDS epidemic

Waking up to devastation

Experience has shown that there are effective measures that businesses can take to
respond to the epidemic (see Box 5). A study in 40 Zimbabwean factories demonstrated that strengthened prevention efforts in the workplace can reduce HIV transmission (and the future costs associated with it) when compared with workplaces
that have weaker prevention programmes. In all 40 factories, workers were given
information about preventing HIV and were offered voluntary counselling and HIV
testing. In half the factories, workers could also choose to speak privately with one
of the peer educators - workers who had been specially trained to discuss HIV prevention with their colleagues, make condoms available, and provide information
about sexually transmitted infections and where they could be treated.
Discouragingly, the number of new HIV infections actually rose over the two-year
period of the study in both groups of factories and in all age groups. But the good
news for the managers of factories with peer educators was that the rise was 34%
less in these factories than in the others. This substantial reduction was achieved at
a cost of around US$ 6 per employee - less than the cost of one set of protective
overalls.
Since untreated syphilis, gonorrhoea and other sexually transmitted infections
increase the risk of acquiring and passing on HIV (see pages 71-72), companies
seeking to prevent HIV in the workforce have a clear interest in making sure that
these infections are treated quickly and effectively. Many companies have their own
clinics at which workers can be treated for free. Companies that consider this option
too expensive might reflect on the findings of a company survey in Botswana, which
showed that workers lost several hours waiting at government clinics where free
external treatment was available. The associated lost productivity probably cost the
company much more than providing private treatment would have done.

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