Corporate Responsibility Report 2008

The cost of disease

Ill health is expensive for the individual and for society. It is often a result of poverty but it is also an important cause of poverty.

For patients it can mean loss of quality of life, loss of earnings and shortened life expectancy. It can place a great burden on families – for instance the need to care for sick relatives can reduce attendance at school or work. For governments, employers and taxpayers it can mean increased healthcare costs and loss of workforce productivity.

In Africa and parts of Asia, AIDS has had a serious effect on social and economic development, undermining progress towards the Millennium Development Goals and poverty reduction efforts. The World Bank estimates that the deaths of working age adults from HIV/AIDS may subtract one per cent a year from GDP economic growth in some sub-Saharan African countries. In South Africa HIV/AIDS may depress GDP by as much as 17 per cent over the next decade¹. Malaria is estimated to cost African nations at least $12 billion a year in lost economic output². The economic cost of TB-related deaths, including HIV co-infection, in sub-Saharan Africa is estimated at $519 billion between 2006 and 2015³.

Read about our research into diseases of the developing world and our efforts to help people in these countries access essential medicines and vaccines .

According to the US government’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the costs of chronic disease in the US alone include⁴:

$174 billion a year in direct and indirect costs due to diabetes
$81 billion in annual medical care costs for arthritis, and total costs including medical care and lost productivity of almost $128 billion
$448 billion projected cost for 2008 for heart disease and stroke

Read about how we are working in partnership in the US to combat chronic disease and the role of our vaccines in preventing disease.

1. www.who.int/trade/glossary/story051/en/index.html
2. Rollback Malaria http://rbm.who.int/globaladvocacy/pr2007-11-29.html
3. http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2007/pr64/en/index.html
4. www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/overview.htm