{"id":378197,"date":"2017-11-29T06:28:09","date_gmt":"2017-11-29T06:28:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=378197"},"modified":"2017-11-30T13:31:59","modified_gmt":"2017-11-30T13:31:59","slug":"novo-nordisk-qa-how-danish-giant-boosted-ghanas-diabetes-fight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2017\/11\/novo-nordisk-qa-how-danish-giant-boosted-ghanas-diabetes-fight\/","title":{"rendered":"Novo Nordisk Q&A: How Danish giant boosted Ghana’s diabetes fight"},"content":{"rendered":"
As part of the Queen of Denmark, Margrethe II’s trip to Ghana, a number of top Danish businesses who accompanied her including multinational pharmaceutical company, Novo Nordisk, were put under the spotlight.<\/p>\n
Novo Nordisk manufactures and markets\u00a0pharmaceutical\u00a0products and services, and is a pioneer in the treatment of diabetes.<\/p>\n
In the first of a two-part series, host of the Citi Breakfast Show, Bernard Avle<\/strong>, speaks\u00a0\u00a0to CEO of the company,\u00a0 Lars\u00a0Fruergaard J\u00f8rgensen, on the company’s work in the treatment of diabetes and obesity, and their contributions to healthcare delivery in Ghana.<\/p>\n Ben: You are the new CEO of Novo Nordisk. It\u2019s a huge company, tell us what is it like to be running an organisation of that size and how you do it?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n Lars<\/strong>: It\u2019s a great privilege to have that role. I\u2019ve been with the company for 26 years. When you\u2019ve spent your whole working life in the company, to become CEO one day is fantastic. It\u2019s a special pleasure because it\u2019s a company where, as a CEO, I need to satisfy my shareholders but we run our business based on what we call a triple bottom line principle. So I have to be accountable for the financial resources and also environmental impact and social responsibility. Being here in Ghana is part of that because we think we have a special responsibility for both employees of the company and also the patients we serve. Helping people with diabetes is basically what we do both from a business point of view but also from a socially responsible way of conducting business.<\/p>\n Ben: Your company is a massive and impressive organisation and you are a global player. Africa has some of\u00a0 the diabetes burden but in terms of economic power, Ghana is a small player. Why would a global CEO of a multinational company like yours be so interested in Ghana to the extent of signing MoUs and coming here yourself?<\/strong><\/p>\n Lars:<\/strong> We are committed to people with diabetes all over the world including in Africa and Ghana. You\u2019re right that this is a very small business for us, but in Ghana we have as many people \u2013 around 8% – living with diabetes. Many of them, more than 70% are not diagnosed and do not know they have it. We feel a responsibility for going into partnerships with local faith-based groups, the Catholic church and the Ministry of Health to help people do screenings and ultimately make sure that you get to know early on if you have diabetes. Because if you get treated early, you can live a much better life, free of complications. If you walk around with the condition for a long time and discover it late, it will have a more devastating impact on your life and on the health system that has to treat it.<\/p>\n