Picture: THINKSTOCK
Picture: THINKSTOCK

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COMPANIES may save money from the outset by providing HIV-positive employees with treatment, a study at Anglo American’s coal operations in SA shows.

The research, published on Tuesday by the peer review journal PLOS Medicine, found that providing anti-retroviral therapy to all eligible employees cut the total costs of HIV/AIDS to the company by 6% over 20 years. The cost per HIV-positive employee fell by 14%.

The study adds to the growing body of research on the economic benefits of providing HIV/AIDS treatment. The researchers said it was the first cost-benefit analysis of providing treatment based on primary data, collected over 10 years from 2003.

"Beyond making good business sense, a company-level HIV care programme, including antiretroviral therapy, could go a long way towards improving the strained labour relations in the mining sector, especially when improved access to healthcare extends to the entire community.

"It is crucial that strategies such as those under study here are replicated in other companies in similar settings," said the authors.

In 2001 Anglo American became the first South African employer to commit to providing free antiretrovirals to its uninsured workers on a large scale, at a time when the government refused to do so.

Anglo American’s former medical director, Brian Brink, who co-authored the paper, said the research confirmed the company’s strategy, which had been right at the time.

"The outcome is really positive support for providing access to treatment. If it works in the microcosm of a business, it must apply on a broader basis to the entire economy.

"It is very supportive of the investment we as a country are making in HIV/AIDS treatment. It’s beneficial to the economy, to development and to individuals," he said.

The study used a mathematical model to determine that the biggest savings in providing antiretroviral therapy were due to reductions in benefits paid for death and ill-health retirement; followed by a decrease in the cost of employee healthcare use, lead author Gesine Meyer-Rath, of Boston University and the University of the Witwatersrand, said.

Although the government now provides free HIV/AIDS treatment to more than 3-million patients, Anglo American still gives treatment to HIV-positive workers who do not belong to medical schemes. By the end of 2010, 1,149 of the 9,252 employees in its coal mining operations tested positive for HIV.