The second SABCOHA Private Sector conference began yesterday with a call for renewed action from  business by Business Unity South Africa (BUSA), SABCOHA and Metropolitan at the Work the Future Road Show, which was presented to delegates in the opening session.

The conference was held over two days at Emporers Palace in Gauteng.

According to the Actuarial Society of South Africa, Gauteng is experiencing the second most severe HIV epidemic in the country. A total of 1,4 million people (15 percent of the Gauteng population) and one in every five adults are estimated to be HIV-positive. Although Gauteng has a relatively high take-up of antiretroviral treatment (60 percent), the model estimates that there will still be about 100 000 new infections in 2008. This is more than the total number of annual new HIV infections in the entire United States.

Now is the time for business leaders to join hands and help to shape the future response to HIV and AIDS in our country, according to the three participating organisations. The chief aim of the road show is to engage business leaders on their role in the HIV and AIDS and STI Strategic Plan for South Africa, 2007 - 2011 (NSP), to promote "critical" business collaboration, and to highlight what business is doing - or failing to do - in addressing the prevention of HIV infections and in providing treatment, care and support.

In his keynote address, Professor Wiseman Nkuhlu, the president of the International Organisation of Employers and chairman of Metropolitan Holdings, said that South Africa was unlikely to reach the international community's target of providing universal access to HIV/AIDS treatment, care and support by 2010 - reaffirmed at the Mexico International Aids Conference in August this year - unless immediate action was taken.

"We are far behind, so we make this call to business in particular to redouble efforts to broaden and deepen private-public partnerships that will scale up our impact, both in terms of treatment and prevention; urgent action is essential," he stressed.

Tipping point

Nathea Nicolay, Metropolitan Employee Benefit's manager of AIDS Risk Consulting, said that South Africa was at a tipping point that would reduce new infections running at a current 500 000 a year.

"There is renewed energy from the new dispensation. The government is calling for better collaboration between the private and public sectors and there is a strong focus on HIV and AIDS from the new minister of health. This could ultimately break the spiral of new infections and deaths and steer us towards a ‘Summer for All People' scenario instead of the current scenario, which is more similar to our worst case estimates," she said.

This optimal scenario is characterised by commonplace compulsory counselling and voluntary testing in the workplace, heavy business investment in behaviour change and at least 25 percent of people testing their status every year. This also features strong collaborative leadership and high social collaboration with the focus firmly on preventing new infections.

In this scenario, business drives prevention efforts through compulsory counselling and voluntary testing initiatives and individuals take personal responsibility for their health.

"However, if business does not successfully address prevention, we might see a ‘Winter of Discontent' scenario, with 8,7 million new infections and 8,1 million AIDS deaths over the 20 years from 2005 to 2025," the actuary warned.

Such a scenario illustrates the devastating effect that a failure to respond successfully to the epidemic will have, especially given the potential for low economic growth created by the current international credit crisis.

Not sustainable

South Africa's current relatively high levels of access to ART might not be sustainable with low economic growth and increasing health care demands. Even under the ‘Summer for All People,' and ‘Autumn of Limited Opportunity' scenarios it is questionable whether the health system would be able to handle over a million people, the number Nicolay estimated would be on ART by 2025.

She estimated a less than 50 percent uptake of HIV disease management programmes in business - echoing the half a million people who had so far accessed treatment out of the million estimated to be in need of it in the public sector.

Lead by example

Brad Mears, the chief executive of SABCOHA, said South Africa's destiny was "in our own hands".

Business needs to focus on the goals of the NSP, which closely match the ‘Summer for All' scenario, to reduce new infections by half by 2011 and expand access to treatment, care and support to 80 percent of those in need.

To achieve "the destiny we desire", universal commitment to four "zero tolerance" goals was needed. These were: achieving a society where new infections were not tolerated; no mother to child infections; no-one dying or getting sick from AIDS; and no tolerance for stigma or discrimination.

Vic van Vuuren, the chief operating officer of BUSA, urged companies who were successfully managing HIV and AIDS programmes in the workplace to "think creatively" about how they could share their knowledge and resources. One example would be using their supply chain networks to open up opportunities and access funding for SMMEs, while another would be collaborating with NGOs that received international funding.

The Work the Future Road Show will roll out across South Africa, with its programme uniquely tailored to the business sector, outlining the effects of the epidemic in each province, before the end of the year.

Click here to view the Keynote Address presentation given by Jay Naidoo: keynote_address

Click here to view the conference website:

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