Just as no country has remained untouched by AIDS so too has no institution of note remained entirely immune. Until recently most in the business sector assigned responsibility for the pandemic to governments activists or the public health community. There is a growing experience however from multinational companies to small and medium enterprises that becoming involved in the fight against HIV/AIDS is crucial not only for reasons of good corporate citizenship but increasingly out of a more comprehensive understanding of corporate self interest. Devastating the fabrics of society in much of sub-Saharan Africa and escalating dramatically in the world’s fastest growing markets including China India and Russia the pandemic stands to alter economic potential and political stability in our world’s most important emerging economies. AIDS left to run rampant places in jeopardy accurate risk profiles and measures of policy stability fiscal responsibility and ensuing exchange rate stability and a host of other factors crucial to accurate projections of profitability in the medium-term. While firms may have the flexibility to draw on plentiful labor markets when AIDS takes its toll they do not have similar ability to operate in isolation of the broader environment in which they exist. (excerpt)