Although it has one of the most dynamic economies in Africa, Botswana also has one of the world's highest known rates of HIV/AIDS infection. In this country of 1.56 million, an estimated 350,000 people are living with the disease. The largest segment of HIV infected citizens are between the ages of 15 and 49.
In response, the Botswana government is developing comprehensive programs to cope with both the disease and the region's shortage of physicians and medical personnel. In conjunction with Harvey Friedman, chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Penn Medical School and director of the Penn Program in Botswana, Botswana's Ministry of Health has authorized a center at Wharton -- the Sol C. Snider Entrepreneurial Research Center -- to help the country develop a more efficient system to manage HIV/AIDS therapy and monitor HIV patients. One early result of that initiative has been a software monitoring program that, in the long run, could enable nurses to deliver diagnostic and prescriptive services to many more HIV patients than currently possible.
According to Ian C. MacMillan, director of the Snider Center, and James D. Thompson, associate director of Wharton Entrepreneurial Programs, the Botswana project illustrates a new concept they have developed in a study called "Societal Wealth Creation via Experimental Entrepreneurship." The idea is to promote philanthropy which supports business entrepreneurship under a for-profit model that attacks social problems and creates new societal wealth.
Based on four experimental entrepreneurial philanthropy programs that are already in progress, including the one in Botswana, the Snider Center hopes to attract philanthropists to fund university research that can identify potential business opportunities and set up pilot programs to carry them out.
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