Despite medical advances and increasing political will, millions of people worldwide still do not have access to medicines and vaccines.  Three million children around the world still die every year from vaccine preventable diseases – that's six children every minute.  While remarkable progress in the area of treatment for HIV and AIDS, especially over the past several years, less than one-third of those in need of anti-retroviral (ARV) treatment globally are currently receiving it.  For every additional person on treatment, 2.5 people are newly infected with HIV.  We recognize that progress has been made in recent years to expand access to medicines and vaccines, but we remain frustrated, as do many in the global public health community, by the slow progress.

The content on this page was last modified on September 15, 2009.

Merck & Co., Inc., Whitehouse Station, NJ, USA, and Schering-Plough Corporation, Kenilworth, NJ, USA, are now one company. We have combined our global operations under the name Merck & Co., Inc. We are working to update our corporate responsibility Web site to reflect our new, combined, global organization.