More gold mining companies operating in South Africa look set to provide anti-HIV drugs to their employees.
Multinational companies including gold and diamond miners Anglo American and De Beers, brewers Heineken and soft drink manufacturer Coca Cola have already announced plans to provide HIV drugs to at least some of their employees in Africa.
Now Canadian mining companies Placer Dome and Barrick Gold are planning to initiate similar programmes, offering treatment to the estimated third of their work forces infected with HIV.
Placer Dome already has HIV-education programmes in place and gives condoms to its employees, many of whom live miles away from their families. Condom distribution is also an HIV prevention strategy favoured by other mining companies. The BBC recently reported how Ashanti Goldfields in Ghana had managed to cut the rate of new infections by three quarters after it started handing out condoms with pay packets. At the Obuasi mine in 1998, 271 men tested positive for HIV, a figure which fell to 62 last year after implementation of the condom scheme.
However, cost implications mean that Ashanti Goldfields are limiting their 7,000 employees to one condom each, but are making additional supplies available to employees who ask for them. Female employees are being offered female condoms.
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