HIV/AIDS

It's a given that, if not managed properly HIV/AIDS may affect the productivity, profitability and sustainability of SMEs. If you have HIV-positive employees, the Code of Good Practice: Key aspects of HIV/AIDS and Employment, provides clear guidelines on how to put policies in place that will protect your rights as the employer and your workers' rights. It explores issues of employee discrimination, dealing with sick leave and absenteeism, of Voluntary Counselling and Testing, and various other issues dealing with HIV/AIDS at work.

With SMEs usually having a small staff, the environment becomes quite intimate and your employees often feel like an extended family. So it's not surprising that a worker's death can sometimes be very difficult to deal with, particularly if the death was sudden and tragic. Accepting the death of an employee can be difficult for both you and your other employees. Here are a few suggestions to help you adjust with as little disruption to your business as possible.

Statistics show that South Africa has the largest total of it's population living with HIV/AIDS. The productive members of society – aged 18 to 36 – have the highest rate of infection. This means that, if the disease isn't managed correctly, your business can be affected through a narrowing customer and service provider base, not to mention the loss of employees due to illness or death. Is there anything you can do about it?

We are a non-profit organisation (NPO). We provide a confidential, anonymous 24 hour toll-free telephone counselling, information, and referral service for people infected with and affected by HIV. The national AIDS helpline is run by LifeLine. We have a specialised treatment line which is manned by professional nurses. The staff of the treatment line provide quality, accurate and anonymous telephone information, education on antiretroviral (ARV), TB, and STI treatment.

Siyakhana Health Trust is a public benefit organization registered in South Africa to provide health management support to small and medium sized businesses through innovative public-private partnerships. We focus on providing holistic workplace health management to our partner or member SMEs through operationalising the World Health Organisation’s Healthy Workplaces Model in the Border-Kei Region of the Amathole District.

We are an intersectional feminist organization and our mission is to ensure that young womxn and girls enjoy substantive equality, with access to resources and opportunities that enable this. We promote a society where all people share a common humanity, a respect for human rights, and a fair allocation of resources. As an intersectional feminist organization, we recognize the multiple and interconnecting oppressions experienced by womxn through supremacies that include race, gender and class.

The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) was founded in December 1998 to campaign for access to AIDS treatment. It is widely acknowledged as one of the most important civil society organisations active on AIDS in the developing world. Today the TAC continues to represent users of the public healthcare system in South Africa, and to campaign and litigate on critical issues related to the quality of and access to healthcare. The organisation currently has over 8,000 members and a network of 182 branches and provincial offices in seven of South Africa’s nine provinces.

While we may know about HIV/AIDS, SME owners are beginning to realise that it may become a threat to their businesses if not managed correctly. The death of employees, absenteeism due to illness, and even customers and service providers being lost to AIDS-related illnesses, means that we can no longer sit back and do nothing. Finding a way to help your employees is not as hard as you think. All it takes is a little motivation and a lot of support and information.