Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2004. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2004. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Reuters NewMedia - December 1, 2004
While the disease has hit Africa harder than other parts of the world, it has become "the worst epidemic humanity has ever faced" and is spreading at alarming rates around the world, particularly in East Asia and Eastern Europe, he told a World AIDS Day event sponsored by six Wall Street investment firms.
"AIDS is uniquely disruptive to economies because it kills people in the prime of their lives," the U.N. leader said.
"Especially in its early stages, the epidemic tends to strike urban centers, the better educated, the leadership elite and the most productive members of society. These deaths leach profits out of businesses and economies," he said.
With the price of AIDS-related drugs falling, it is now more profitable for companies to treat their employees infected with the virus than to recruit and retrain new workers as untreated workers die, he said.
But corporate board members must also do what they can to "change the course of the epidemic" globally, he said, by speaking up about the disease and what can be done to stop it.
"Silence and stigma drive the virus underground and fuel its spread. Speaking up helps halt it," he said.
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