The new multi-sectoral Guyana Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS is to pay greater attention to the policies and practices of local insurance companies in relation to providing insurance services for Persons Living With HIV/AIDS (PLWHA’s).
The Guyana Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS which includes some of the country’s leading business houses will also be seeking to play a role in influencing the adoption of corporate policies that provide the best possible framework for a positive response to the challenge of HIV/AIDS at the workplace.
Earlier this week the Guyana HIV/AIDS Reduction and Prevention Project (GHARP) announced that the Coalition is seeking to engage the insurance companies in order to persuade them to be “more tolerant” in their approach to providing insurance cover to persons living with HIV/AIDS.
Deputy General Manager of the Guyana Telephone & Telegraph Company (GT&T) and Vice Chairman of the Guyana Busi-ness Coalition on HIV/AIDS Terry Holder told the press conference that the Coalition was concerned over the fact that “insurance companies do not provide adequate coverage” for PLWHA’s. Holder said that he recalled that during discussions among the Coalition partners a decision had been taken “to draw our concern to the attention of the insurance companies” and to seek to have them become part of the Coalition. Holder said that it was the view of the Coalition that if local insurance companies were to be persuaded to “come on board” they would better appreciate how their regulations affect what the Coalition was seeking to do.
Local insurance companies are considered to be behind their counterparts in various other regions where the insurance sector and workplaces have collaborated to provide specialized insurance services that seek to respond to the particular needs of PLWHA’s.
GHARP official Deryck Cummings told Stabroek Business that the organization was keen to include insurance companies in what he described as “the highly successful partnership” that had already been forged with the local business community to respond to the HIV/AIDS challenge. Cummings said that GHARP had been successful in securing the services of local insurance brokers Abdool and Abdool, one of its partners, to explore ways of realizing a more liberal local insurance cover regime for PLWHA’s. According to Cummings Abdool and Abdool have agreed to investigate some of the issues that affect insurance coverage for PLWHA’s including securing overseas underwriting of local policies for PLWHA’s.
Cummings told Stabroek Business that the new local Business Coalition will be seeking to get the insurance companies “on board” with the new HIV/AIDS “alliance” that includes the banking, telecommunications, agricultural, mining and manufacturing sectors. He said that GHARP had also been working through the Rotary Club of Guyana – where several insurance companies are represented – to seek to develop an enhanced relationship with the insurance sector.
Another issue that surfaced during last Tuesday’s press conference was the delinquency on the part of some local businesses in the payment of worker National Insurance Scheme contributions. Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Guyana Business Coalition and Scotia Bank Country Manager Amanda St Aubyn said that she believed that the payment by business houses of NIS contributions on behalf of their workers was a corporate governance issue and that while she did not think that the terms of reference of the Coalition allowed it “to moved towards issues of corporate governance” she felt, nonetheless, that the Coalition could positively influence issues like NIS compliance. “I believe that through the work of the coalition we can bring about a certain amount of change with regard to letting those organizations who may not be making those contributions see the bigger picture,” she added.
St Aubyn said that the fact that awareness of employer delinquency in the payment of worker NIS contributions had now been created meant that such issues could be advocated at the level of the Coalition since they affect the very workforce the body was seeking to impact.
