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Corporate India aiding AIDS awareness

Published on Sat, Jan 12, 2008 at 12:14 | Source : CNBC-TV18

Updated at Mon, Feb 04, 2008 at 18:28

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One of the greatest challenges facing India is the challenge of the unspoken disease of AIDS . It's been called the ticking time bomb and it could change the course of India's destiny. Sheeren Bhan finds out how corporate India is doing its bit to bring about change.

The UNAIDS report for 2007 claims that every day 6,800 people get infected with the HIV Virus. Everyday 5,700 people also die of this disease; this means that over 1,100 new victims of AIDS are added each day. Of the 33.2milion victims of AIDS worldwide; 7.5% are young children. Tragically India is home to 2.5million victims of HIV AIDS, the third worst effected country in the world after South Africa and Nigeria.

A study by the WHO states that, in developing countries like India, only 5% of those who need anti-recto viral treatment receive it. This is because of lack of knowledge, expertise and practically, no healthcare infrastructure.

Corporate India is now partnering the Government to drive change.

The anti-recto viral therapy center at Unit Ballarpur, the second to be started in the country as a public private partnership initiative, caters to the treatment of HIV positive patients in the four districts around central Maharashtra's Chandrapur.

"We have set up the first one in Ballarpur. There are areas in India that have already been identified as high incident of AIDS and mostly it is the trucking and the trunk routes out there, and there is a need for that. So we will go ahead and do that and each of these centers and each center needs around Rs 3-5crore to setup with the infrastructure, doctors, physical infrastructure and we have tied up with CII and with NACO (National AIDS Control Organization) to provide the drugs which come at a cost" says Gautam Thapar, Group Chairman of Avantha.

This ART (anti-recto viral therapy) center specializes and also conveying the message to the victims that being HIV positive is not always the end of life. With proper medical treatment, an HIV positive individual can still lead a healthy life. Anti retro viral therapy or ART restores the immune system, which prevents the patients from getting infections. This therefore enhances both the quality of life as well as longevity.

"Most of the cases are already Diagnosed cases, so this is just for the cure and treatment which is one part whereas the other part is counseling. So it is an integrated approach which includes counseling, diagnosis, treatment, approach and also includes all the issues like, legal, social, spiritual, ethical and the most important is medical issue" adds Amit Murkey, Doctor at Ballarpur ART center

The ART centers also have one on one counseling sessions with patients to tell them about their treatment and also educate them on the precautions that they need to take, so as to not transfer the HIV virus. These sessions also help patients to get over the stigma of AIDS and get them to talk about the unspoken disease.

"There are just two-three IT private companies having the ART center, within the hospital. One of these is BILT. There are very less companies other than BILT who have their own hospital and the ART center. So it is also useful for the BILT people, workers, truck drivers and people who are more prone to get infected by that." feels Amit Murkey.

"We have this whole belt of Chandrapur, Nagpur areas because of mining and all areas which are heavily and densely populated in terms of industry, trucking etc and that are why we will see more of that. The next place probably will be Seva where the need is and I think we will spread that out as we think it is an important initiative" adds Gautham Thapar:

While companies like BILT have stepped into provide anti-retro viral therapy, domestic pharma giant Ranbaxy, is taking its anit-AIDS message to the world. Today Ranbaxy is not just one of the companies of the world that specializes in producing anti-retro viral drugs but is also to world's cheapest. It also exports these drugs to around 125 countries and also provides pre-and post sales support to NGOs, the ministry of Health and institutions like the ART centers run by BILT.

"Today we are treating over 4,00,000 patients around the world for HIV AIDS across 60 countries and this gives us a wafer thin margin to ensure that this is sustainable as a business model. It is not that we are making money from it but we are not loosing money either being a commercial enterprise but what we been able to do is to make sure that people around the world who are not getting medicines, where medicines are priced over USD 10-15 to USD 20,000 a year are today available at under a USD 100 a year" says Malvinder Singh, CEO at Ranbaxy

A pharma company, Ranbaxy believes that prevention is better than cure. So its social arm, the Ranbaxy Community Health Society or RCHS, organizes street plays to educate people on preventing the HIV virus.

"It's the way you communicating the message and if it comes across through doctors or through presentations which the audience might view as very dry or very serious, you probably won't get that crowd and attraction to share with them and to increase the level of awareness. So through this plays, you are able to gather more people in the villages, who find this interesting and yet you are able to communicate the same message through a different platform. So it is more to do with the medium of communication but the message remains the same," adds Malvinder Singh.

Like Ranbaxy, international banking giant, Standard Chartered is also working towards spreading AIDS awareness. It runs a program called 'Living with HIV' in educating its employees and their families with AIDS. These trained volunteers then travel across the country as change agents.

"The programme is known as 'Living with HIV.' It's not about that person being stigmatized or that person being given special attention, that's not what Living with HIV is all about. It's about a person living a normal life, as normal as possible," says Pratima Harite, Instructor of Living with HIV.

Standard Chartered has rolled out the Living with HIV programme across 56 countries and they now have around 250 champions who volunteer their time and conduct AIDS workshops. In India around 22 champions support the programme across Standard Chartered's 81 branches in 31 cities.

" Standard Chartered Bank operates in Africa and Asia, which is really our footprint and in Africa, we were facing a large problem of staff absenteeism and staff recruitment. So we launched this programme in Africa at that time with the objective of being able to support our staff through this whole epidemic. As we rolled it out, we found that the acceptance was so great and the fact that HIV was actually a problem which is far beyond Africa; we extended this in 2003 globally to all our counties" says Neeraj Swaroop, CEO India at Standard Chartered.

The government is trying its best to control the AIDS menace and corporate India is also chipping in quite effectively. Here is the story of Cummins India Foundation, the social arm of Cummins India and how it is trying to attack the problem at its route.

There is no denying that most HIV positive cases in the world are a result of unprotected sex and with sex being a taboo in India, the problem becomes even harder to deal with. It's a battle hard to win but baby steps are being taken.

This NGO called Snehalaya is based in the heart of Maharashtra's Ahmednagar city. The best thing that hits you is almost strong nauseating smell. It's the smell of a live but decaying human body. Established in 1989, this NGO helps rehabilitate former sex workers and their children, many of whom are HIV positive. The NGO helps rescue these AIDS victims from red light areas and even nearby districts. They then provide them with housing, food, medication and also education, thanks to the financial help provided by the Cummins India Foundation.

Anant Talaulikar, CMD, Cummins India says, "This is where I said - wherever our employees show the personal passion to do something, we are definitely going to support that kind of a view because it lines up with our vision of making peoples lives better. So this was a case where this organization was again next-door to one of our operations in Ahmednagar, in this case and employees learnt about it, got involved and this was long before the financial help came from the foundation."

The women and children are poverty stricken and to most of them, this place is a same haven. Of the 161 children how reside here 52 are infected. Of the 21 women 9 are HIV+. Snehalaya and Cummins volunteers give HIV victims a home and help them live life with dignity. The whole facility is kept clean and free of inflections but these patients know that the journey to the hospital is usually a one-way journey.

Talaulikar says, "I would say it is very close to the hearts and particularly of the employees of Cummins in Ahmednagar. They really have gone out of their way, I mean it is emotional based, I think in this case. Again you could argue that it doesn't quite line up in top three priorities, but this is where as I said where employees show the personal passion to do something we are definitely going to support that kind of a view right because again it lines up with our vision of making people's lives better."

Thanks to the funds now coming its way Snehalaya can also afford antiretroviral medication for the patients who need it the most- presently, 29 children. It works out to Rs 1,100 per child per day. A small amount to see a smile on their faces, as appose to dread and fear.

Talaulikar adds, "We do have a sort of a policy where we set aside a certain amount of our profits into the Foundation and then the Foundation channels it into these three priority areas. But I think the real intent is to engage our employees in this work and it is part of making it a great place to work."

Apart from all this, Snehalaya also runs an adoption center, which presently has 4 infants, healthy and medically fit, free of any ailment- waiting for a new beginning.

If you would like to contact Snehalaya then here are the details- Snehalaya, Ahmednagar-- 0241-232755, 2327666, 2327593.

The transportation business is perhaps the most affected by the deadly HIV virus. We travel now with the Transport Corporation of India to the heart of India -Nagpur, that's the central point where most transporters and truckers converge. TCI is spreading the message of AIDS awareness in this very vulnerable community.

Rajesh Shivse is a man on a mission. Trained by the Transport Corporation of India he is more than just a truck driver. He is also a teacher who uses every dabba stopover to educate fellow truckers about the hazards of unsafe sex and AIDS.

"Wherever I stop at any dabba and when all the truck drivers gather together, we talk to each other and share the information about hazardous diseases like HIV and AIDS. We always keep our charts with us wherever we go." Says Rajesh Shivse.

As the truck moves from one destination to the other, it carries with it a hope for lakh of truckers. In fact Rajesh is not the only one; there are several others like him who are gearing up to weigh a war against this deadly disease.

Transport Corporation's project Kavach started five years ago also uses innovative ways to spread the message and the message is well received.

"We got a message that if we will be cautious we will be saved from it" says Kamlesh, a truck driver

Field workers say that the concept is a huge success.

"With the medium of ITC we cover 50,000 people in a month. 1,050 activities happen through which we cover 35,000 people" says Fidius, Field Officer of Operation Kavach.

Reason enough for Rajesh and his friends to keep going.

Like TCI, cement major Gujarat Ambuja is also doing a bit to spread AIDS awareness amongst its employees and their families in Himachal.

Ambuja Cement Foundation is the company's social wing. That works as a separate entity and is a well-registered NGO that gets most of its funding from Gujarat Ambuja Ltd.

Ambuja Cement Foundation or ACF is primarily centered around spreading AIDS awareness in and around its cement plants across North India.

These counseling sessions held by the social workers of ACF aim at spreading awareness to truck drivers, commercial-sex workers and other local villagers.

20 kilometers of Punjab's capital Chandigarh, is the city of Ropar. This area has a large population of truck drivers, who transport raw materials to the Gujarat Ambuja Cement plant in Ropar and carry cements to locations across India. These truckers are on the road for at least three weeks in a month and are most susceptible to acquiring sexually transmitted diseases like AIDS.

The Ambuja Cement Foundation has set up condom vending machines at dabba's in this region for easy access. Besides vending machines, ACF is also involved in direct communication with truck drivers. Volunteers for trucks driving in the region sit with the driver and educate them about sexually transmitted diseases. This campaign has helped spread awareness efficiently without the truckers scheduling have been reworked.

"We realized that the entire process takes around 30-35 minutes and at times it becomes tiring for the trucker to halt on a highway and discuss for 30-35 minutes, an issue which is not very inclined to discuss. So we though why should be waste the time basically trucker time. Why shouldn't we actually travel with him and on the way we can discuss? So our team travels with the truckers and after completing the session they get down and catch another truck coming back to the point from where they started" says Vishal, Regional Programme Co-ordinator.

The Ambuja Cement Foundation has also setup mobile medical vans that visit truck yards and organize a by monthly free checkup for these truck drivers. Qualified doctors check patients for AIDS symptoms and then direct them to government hospitals.