HIV and AIDS: It's everybody's business

Issue 4 2009 > HIV and AIDS: It's everybody's business

The HIV/AIDS pandemic is a global challenge, particularly in nations such as Africa, India and China. Standard Chartered Bank (SCB), like Crown, has a presence in these markets and many other developing countries of the world, where there are increasing HIV infection rates. The HIV/AIDS pandemic is making a significant impact on these operations and the communities where both SCB and Crown operate.

SCB has responded to this challenge through its "Living with HIV programme" a global policy aimed at educating one million people about HIV/AIDS over a three-year period. They have developed a workplace education model that has been rolled out to their employees, customers and suppliers, and they invited Crown to become involved in their efforts.

Crown is proud to be one of Standard Chartered Bank’s partners, which entails identifying employees who serve as "Champions and Ambassadors" of the cause, taking the message out internally as well as through community activities and volunteering. The programme aims to help eradicate the stigma of HIV/AIDS which prevents people from getting tested and thus contributes to its spread, by:

Raising awareness with employees through training.
Driving participation in Crown and Standard Chartered sponsored community events to educate local people about the prevention and treatment of HIV.
Sharing knowledge with our families, the community and other Service Partners.

Crown held its first "Living with HIV Workshop" for the staff at Holdings in December 2007 at the Crown Wine Cellars in Hong Kong. Chairman Jim Thompson commented, "I'm truly proud that the staff of the Crown Group at the Holdings office have taken the initiative to partner with Standard Chartered Bank's AIDS awareness programme 'Living with Aids' to educate themselves about this terrible problem. We must all understand what we can do as individuals to help and by starting here in Hong Kong. The staff is showing just how Crown will be doing its part."

Following more sessions in Hong Kong, the program expanded to additional markets in Asia. Anastasia Vuong, systems and procedures trainer for Southeast Asia, in partnership with staff members from SCB, held sessions in Thailand, Indonesia and Vietnam. Anastasia said, "In Indonesia, the staff members were a bit shy at first, but the different games quickly put everyone at ease." Martin Cole, systems consultant and trainer for Records Management Asia-Pacific, and Stephen Lynch, area manager based in Wellington, New Zealand, hosted a session in Singapore.

HIV and AIDS: It's everybody's business Crown Malaysia recently conducted two sessions. The local SCB trainers also worked hand-in-hand with Crown Malaysia to carry out these two successful awareness sessions in Kuala Lumpur. The trainers got participants involved using educational games to break the ice and help illustrate what HIV is, how it is transmitted, how to prevent and treat it. Participants were also encouraged to share the knowledge they acquired from these sessions with their families, friends and community to raise awareness and spread the word about prevention.

The teams helped eliminate some misconceptions regarding this illness, like the common notion that HIV can be transmitted via mosquito bites or by sharing cutlery. Most of the participants were very surprised to learn that an affected mother can give birth to a healthy HIV negative child. Staff also got a much better understanding of how infected people go from HIV to developing AIDS and realized that HIV is spreading quickly and silently.

Throughout 2009, Sarah Boyle, global account manager for SCB and Mima Grayson, team leader based in Dubai, carried out a number of training sessions in their regions. Sarah noted, "Feedback has been very positive and many participants commented on how the sessions clarified misconceptions about the transmission of the disease. They also determined that 90% of the known cases of HIV in the UK could have been easily avoided by taking precautions, and making use of educational and preventative tools readily available in the UK."

HIV is a virus which does not discriminate according to race, borders or salary. All of us can protect ourselves and our loved ones, and awareness is the first step in the global battle to prevent the spread of HIV while the scientists work at getting closer to finding a cure.

This is only the beginning of Crown's involvements with "Living with HIV in motion." Future trainings are planned for other worldwide locations with Crown’s regional trainers enthusiastically reaching out to local teams.