Business leaders in Singapore have teamed up with the health ministry
to persuade companies to combat discrimination against employees with
HIV and Aids.
The main job of the Aids Business Alliance is to convince employers to run Aids education programmes.
Senior health minister Balaji Sadasivan, officially starting the
campaign, said: ‘Today, if a person has HIV and goes to work, chances
are if co-workers know, they will be very afraid of him. What we want
to do is to educate people so that they are not afraid of the
HIV-positive person. It also makes it easier for employers to continue
employing him, as his co-workers are willing to work with him.’
An MP, Wang Kai Yuen, who is also managing director of Xerox Singapore
Software Centre, leads the initiative, which is based on an
existing HIV and Aids education programme run by Standard Chartered
Bank.
