Anglo American, together with the Anglo American Foundation, have pledged $15 million to support the Global Fund to end HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis (TB) and malaria and build resilient systems for health and pandemic preparedness. The pledge was delivered in New York, during the Global Fund’s Seventh Replenishment week.
The health and well-being of employees and host communities form an integral part of Anglo American’s Sustainable Mining Plan. Built around three major sustainability pillars of Healthy Environment, Thriving Communities, and Trusted Corporate Leader, the plan is aligned with the attainment of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. Thriving Communities focuses on creating better health, well-being, education, and employment outcomes for host communities, with significant investments by the company and the Anglo American Foundation on long-term system-level change within priority focus areas, including healthy living.
Mpumi Zikalala, CEO of Anglo American’s Kumba Iron Ore business and Chairperson of the South African National Aids Council’s Private Sector Forum, said: “Building a more equitable healthcare system globally is in our DNA as a company – it is how we do business. Through our long history of supporting major public health programmes to help improve the health of our employees and host communities and running major health facilities around our operations over many decades, we recognise that good health and well-being are essential to building thriving communities and economies.
“Our contribution to the Global Fund enables us to meaningfully contribute to shaping the agenda associated with relevant national health programmes while supporting the successful delivery of our Sustainable Mining Plan health interventions.”
Anglo American has a longstanding partnership with the Global Fund, both as a member of the Fund’s Board and a significant contributor to the Fund’s activities.
Peter Sands, Executive Director of the Global Fund, said: “We are tremendously grateful to Anglo American, together with the Anglo American Foundation, for once again committing funds to support our lifesaving work. Through its industry-leading commitment to health and well-being, Anglo American is showing how powerful partnerships can be to fight for what counts – to defeat HIV, TB and malaria and end health inequity”. The digital solutions that the company will support through the Digital Health Accelerator can transform progress in the fight against diseases and prepare countries for future threats.”
Anglo American and the Anglo American Foundation’s combined $15 million contribution will fall under the Global Fund’s Digital Health Impact Accelerator Catalytic Fund – which will promote investment in community health systems to improve the quality of community health worker programmes through digitisation, for example through the improvement of the interoperability of health data systems. Partners for this initiative include Zenysis and Novartis Foundation.
“As an anchor partner of this initiative, we will help facilitate the strengthening of community health systems and their resilience to respond to future pandemics and health-related shocks. The accelerator is aligned with our focus as a company, and that of the Anglo American Foundation and its focus on building strategic partnerships to achieve impact.
Achieving good health and well-being requires us to strengthen the quality of community health systems collectively, while also promoting the resilience of health systems in our host communities and the countries where we operate,” said Dr Alexandra Plowright, Lead for Community Health and Wellbeing at Anglo American.
Further information about Anglo American’s longstanding support for health programmes:
• In 1986, Anglo American launched two HIV-related initiatives: an education and awareness programme aimed at the entire workforce; and the provision of more than $5 million in funding to prominent researchers in Europe and the US to investigate treatment possibilities using decoy CD4 proteins inserted into red blood cells.
• With more than 120,000 employees throughout the 1990s in South Africa, HIV/AIDS was a reality for the company, for its people and their families.
• By 1990, Anglo American was one of the first companies to develop a human-rights-based HIV/AIDS policy. Because little was known about the disease, many employers required a ‘negative’ screening as a prerequisite to guarantee employment. During a time of uncertainty and closed-mindedness, this policy ensured no discrimination against any person living with HIV.
• In 2002, Anglo American was the first major employer to begin offering free anti-retroviral treatment to all its employees, and, in December 2008, Anglo American extended this benefit to employees’ direct dependants. This decision was based largely on the understanding that HIV/AIDS cannot be effectively managed when only one family member receives care for a disease that affects the whole family.
• Anglo American’s world-leading HIV/AIDS response, providing the largest free HIV and AIDS workplace and voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) programme, has been consistently held up as best practice by the Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.
• Workplace HIV/AIDS programmes are in place at all Anglo American’s operations, with activity particularly focused in southern Africa where HIV prevalence was historically high.
• In 2016, Anglo American adopted the test-and-treat approach and aligned its HIV/AIDS targets to UNAIDS 90/90/90 strategy, which means that: 90% of our people living with HIV know their HIV status; 90% of those diagnosed with HIV are receiving sustained anti-retroviral therapy; and 90% of those receiving anti-retroviral therapy have viral suppression, meaning the viral load is so low as to be undetectable.
• In 2018, Anglo American launched its industry-leading Sustainable Mining Plan following extensive internal and external stakeholder engagement. Under the Thriving Communities pillar, Anglo American is committed to prioritising the health and well-being of its communities by investing in strengthening health systems in host communities, as well as activities aimed at supporting healthcare in operating countries.
• In Brazil, Anglo American has partnered with NGO, Reprolatina, to provide health services to more than 63,000 people over the last eight years, making a real difference to lives within the region. In Chile, we’re working with INTA, the national institution for nutrition, on a pilot project to help reduce childhood obesity.
• Since the Covid-19 pandemic began in early 2020, Anglo American worked on multiple fronts to protect its workforce and host communities as part of its WeCare lives and livelihoods programme. Efforts included continuing to maintain robust workplace controls, the roll-out of a comprehensive health management programme, making available up to $30 million to support the global roll-out of Covid-19 vaccines, and ensuring that employees, contractors and their families have access to those vaccines.
More details of Anglo American’s Sustainable Mining Plan are available at https://www.angloamerican.com/sustainability/our-sustainable-mining-plan.
You can also read more about the Anglo American Foundation, and its work on accelerating progress toward attaining the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals here: https://www.angloamericangroupfoundation.org/
