Pharmaceutical companies and the supply of essential drugs to least Assignment

Pharmaceutical companies and the supply of essential drugs to least developed countries (LDCs) - Assignment Example of HIV/AIDS is used as an example for showing the level at which the firm is willing to promote ethics and to ignore the relevant effects on its profitability. The review of the firm’s practices in supporting the patients of HIV in South Africa has revealed the following facts: the firm has taken initiatives for promoting public health, or, else, public good, in the specific regions. However, the performance of the business in fully promoting CSR can be doubted, a view that it can be verified by the allegations that the firm has faced in the past for violating ethics. On the other hand, the measures that the firm took for supporting people in poor countries cannot be ignored. Thus, it could be concluded that the firm is willing to promote CSR but it could not achieve such target without making alterations in its CSR, as suggested below. The expansion of HIV/AIDS in South Africa is quite rapid. In the map in Figure 1 (Appendices) the infection from HIV globally is presented; through this map it is made clear that South Africa holds the first place, along with other African countries of the mid-Africa region, in regard to the infection from HIV. In South Africa the expansion of HIV seems to be related mostly to young girls who become victims of sexual exploitation by old men (BBC News 2013). The graph in Figure 2 (Appendices) presents the percentage of girls as compared to boys affected from HIV in Kenya; the difference between the two categories is clear. According to a report published in March of 2013 a percentage of about ‘25% school-girls in South Africa’ (BBC News 2013, par.1) has been infected by HIV/AIDS after suffering a sexual assault. The relevant research refers to young girls up to 14 years. In fact, in South Africa women are more exposed to the risk of HIV/AIDS than men: women in South Afri ca are infected by HIV/ AIDS at a percentage of 23.2% while for men the relevant percentage is significantly lower, about 18.8% (BBC News 2014, par.4). Today,