Corporate governance structures are established to ensure that corporations can be accountable to their owners — the shareholders.  However, Merck’s corporate governance is more than the Company’s relationship to our shareholders, it is our relationship to society, because issues that matter to our key stakeholders can very quickly become important issues for our shareholders. As such, our corporate governance objective is to balance fiduciary duty and accountability to generate long–term shareholder value, while also considering in a transparent manner the feedback from other stakeholders.