Events in the international community

Special Session of the UN General Assembly on HIV/AIDS:
Global Crisis, Global Action

New York, 25-27 June 2001

The ILO participated in the United Nations General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on HIV/AIDS, playing a key role in discussions on HIV/AIDS in the world of work. The ILO Director-General, Juan Somavia, presented the ILO's new Code of Practice on HIV/AIDS and the World of Work (English - français - español) in his statement to the plenary of the Session.

The new Code, based on extensive consultations and negotiations with governments and with employers' and workers' representatives, is intended to help safeguard conditions of decent work and protect the rights and dignity of workers and all people living with HIV/AIDS. It focuses on the key issues of preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS and the protection of workers’ rights, and provides practical guidance to governments, employers and workers for developing national and workplace policies and programmes on prevention, care and support, emphasizing the value of cooperation between all the actors concerned. It reflects the ILO's continuing involvement in the protection of workers’ rights (including employment protection, gender equality and non-discrimination on the basis of HIV status); social protection (employee benefits, treatment, etc.); and confidential voluntary counselling and testing.

The ILO will ensure the effectiveness of the Code of Practice by providing technical assistance and advisory services to governments and the private sector on incorporating provisions of the Code into concrete action, at the national and enterprise levels, that can promote decent work and eliminate discrimination at work on the basis of HIV status. The Code enjoys widespread support among businesses and trade unions.

The Director-General also presented the ILO Code of Practice at a press conference accompanied  by Dr. Lettie Lagrange (Chamber of Mines, South Africa) and Ms. Juliette Lenoir (AFL-CIO, United States), members of the tripartite expert panel who adopted the Code in May. [Link: press conference]

The marked presence of high-profile global business leaders at the conference demonstrated that HIV/AIDS is now recognized as a serious workplace issue. Companies like MTV, Ford and Coca Cola are now partnering up with local governments to join the fight, acknowledging the workplace as the ideal focus for action. At the invitation of the United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the ILO Director-General participated in a meeting of the Global Business Council (GBC) on HIV/AIDS, which is a group of companies making an effort to educate their own workers on the dangers of the virus in order to promote a working environment centered around awareness. The GBC, presided by former chief American Ambassador to the United Nations, Richard Holbrooke, invited the Director-General to present the Code of Practice at  a panel discussion entitled “Business as Partners: Strategic responses to the HIV/AIDS epidemic”.  Fellow panellist William Roedy, (Chair of the Global Business Council on HIV & AIDS (GBC) and President of MTV Networks International) commented that “We [businesses] have not done enough … in the light of what we are capable of … Simply put, we have the potential to reach every human being on earth”. After intense discussions with the Director-General, the GBC pledged its support for the Code with a number of companies, including Coca Cola, expressing a keen wish to join forces with the ILO in the workplace fight against the epidemic.

At a press conference following the panel, ILO Director-General Juan Somavia emphasized the scale of the problem for the world of work, with an estimated 23 million sufferers worldwide in the workplace, an aspect of AIDS recognized as such for the first time during the Special Session.

Strong and widespread interest in the Code at the UNGASS was voiced at the many events in which the ILO participated. At a press conference for NGOs, Stephen Lewis (UN Secretary-General's Special Envoy on AIDS in Africa), speaking alongside Frank Lisk (Director of ILO/AIDS), endorsed the Code of Practice as the most significant tool recently developed. Panellists in an ILO tripartite panel discussion on HIV/AIDS and the world of work included the Director of the Brazilian Government’s national AIDS programme, the General Secretary of NACTU (South Africa) and Dr. Lagrange, who stated that only the ILO could provide the capacity to deal with the disease in the world of work, and that the Code was a very strong document which employers could not fail to adopt. The Code is also available in a pocket-sized version for ease of distribution.

The UNGASS endorsed the role of the ILO as a crucial player in the global campaign against HIV/AIDS by adopting specific language on AIDS in the world of work in the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS adopted at the end of the session. The Declaration contains a call for workplace-based action and specifically asks for national and legal policy framework to be developed in consultation with employers' and workers' organizations in order to protect the rights of workers and those affected or infected by HIV/AIDS.

The ILO launched a new global programme on HIV/AIDS and the world of work in November 2000 in response to the resolution concerning HIV/AIDS and the world of work adopted by the International Labour Conference in June 2000. The programme aims to strengthen the capacity of governments, employers and workers to respond to HIV/AIDS in the world of work.  The programme is the culmination of two years of fact-finding missions and regional and international tripartite workshops and consultations, which began with the Regional Tripartite Workshop on Social and labour implications on HIV/AIDS (Windhoek, 1999) and led to the adoption on the eve of the UNGASS conference of the new ILO Code.

The ILO is currently chairing the 2002 session of the UN Inter-Agency Advisory Group (IAAG), which is responsible for developing the UN System Strategic Plan for HIV/AIDS (2001-2005).

HIV/AIDS and the World of Work

The figures speak for themselves. With an estimated 36 million persons living with HIV in 1999, two-thirds of them in sub-Saharan Africa, and over 5 million newly infected in 1999 alone, HIV/AIDS is an immense human and social tragedy. It is also now beginning to be more widely, if belatedly understood that HIV/AIDS is a major threat to the world of work.

HIV/AIDS is a threat to workers’ rights. People with HIV/AIDS are subject to stigmatization, discrimination or even hostility in the community and at work. The rights of people living with HIV/AIDS, such as the right to non-discrimination, equal protection and equality before the law, to privacy, liberty of movement, work, equal access to education, housing, health care, social security, assistance and welfare, are often violated on the sole basis of their known or presumed HIV/AIDS status. Individuals who suffer discrimination and lack of human rights protection are both more vulnerable to becoming infected and less able to cope with the burdens of HIV/AIDS.

HIV/AIDS is a threat to development. The pandemic has profound negative impacts on the economy, the workforce, the business, individual workers and their families. Economic growth could be as much as 25 per cent lower than it might otherwise have been over a 20-year period in high prevalence countries. Their populations will be about 20 per cent lower by the year 2015 than they would have been without HIV/AIDS, and their labour forces in the year 2020 will be between 10 to 22 per cent smaller. HIV/AIDS also has a significant impact on the composition of the labour force in terms of age, skills and experience.

HIV/AIDS is a threat to enterprise performance. The world of work is affected by increasing costs due to health care, absenteeism, burial fees, recruitment, training and re-training. For smaller firms in both the formal and informal sectors, the loss of employees has major implications. In the rural sector, losses due to HIV/AIDS may reduce food production and food security. Enterprises in sectors such as transportation, tourism and mining are the most vulnerable. Overall, there will be a reduction of growth if rapid measures are not taken to prevent the impact of HIV/AIDS.

HIV/AIDS is a threat to gender equality. Women are highly vulnerable to HIV/AIDS for both biological and cultural reasons. They are particularly affected by HIV/AIDS when a male head of household falls ill. The burden of caring for children orphaned as a result of the pandemic is borne mainly by women. Loss of income from a male income-earner may compel them to seek other sources of income, putting them at risk of sexual exploitation.

HIV/AIDS increases child labour. The tremendous pressure on households and families often forces children to work. As a result, it is difficult for them to attend school, they do not receive proper care and guidance, and easily fall victim to all kinds of exploitation.

For all these reasons, HIV/AIDS is a major factor undermining the ILO’s guiding principle of decent work. People living with HIV/AIDS are often forced to leave their jobs and are isolated in their communities, with minimal opportunities to earn an income. In the absence of adequate public support systems, especially in the developing countries, families have to bear the full cost of the disease, pushing them deeper into poverty. HIV/AIDS prevention is poverty alleviation.

Yet in so many countries, even those which are worst affected, prevention and care are impeded by a persistent culture of denial, both in society and the world of work.

The ILO has to play a pivotal role in overcoming this culture of denial and in addressing HIV/AIDS in the world of work. A global partnership is required to develop a comprehensive response to the impact of HIV/AIDS on the world of work. Although governments and employers’ and workers’ organizations have started to respond to the effects of the pandemic on the world of work, the complexity and extent of the pandemic require global initiatives by the ILO and support for action at the national and enterprise levels. The ILO has the expertise in this area and, through its long history, has established the necessary relations with the social partners all over the world. In particular, the large numbers of members of employers’ and workers’ organizations offer an ideal channel for awareness-raising, prevention and support initiatives at all levels.  

An ILO Special High-Level Meeting on HIV/AIDS and the World of Work was held during the International Labour Conference in June 2000 (Geneva, 8 June 2000) with the theme of HIV/AIDS: A threat to decent work, productivity and development. At that same session of the International Labour Conference in June 2000 a Cooperation Framework Agreement was signed between the ILO and UNAIDS.  The agreement provides for collaboration on policy and activities focusing on the fight against HIV/AIDS at the national and international levels, including –

• UNAIDS projects in 20 countries, in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean;
• awareness-raising programmes, the promotion of experts at enterprise and national levels and establishing networks of technical resources to encourage the creation of national, governmental and non-governmental programmes on HIV/AIDS.

ILO/AIDS projects:

• The ILO works closely with employers’ and workers’ organisations on issues concerning advocacy and knowledge; peer education and training; activities aimed at changing attitudes and behaviour - linking workplace initiatives with community-based projects for prevention, care and support; ILO/AIDS is in consultation with individual governments, including the United States (Department of Labor), India, the Russian Federation, and countries in the Caribbean subregion and in Africa.
• The ILO is working with the National School of Public Health and the Office of the President of South Africa to set up a postgraduate diploma in HIV/AIDS Management in the World of Work. The programme involves ten countries in the subregion and will be taught by distance learning using satellite technology.
• Currently under discussion with the Governments of the United States, France, Norway, the United Kingdom, the European Union and the UN Foundation are proposals regarding funding for country programmes on AIDS.
• Current ILO research areas include: HIV/AIDS and child labour; human rights and HIV/AIDS; globalization and HIV/AIDS.