Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, Eli Lilly and Company, and Viatris, the new company formed from the combination of Mylan and Upjohn, Pfizer’s off-patent branded and generic established medicines business, have outlined environmental, social, and governance (ESG) goals by detailing plans for the companies’ sustainability targets.

Teva

Teva’s 2020 Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Progress Report highlights the company’s goals, including launching eight programs to increase access to medicines globally by 2025 and reducing Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas emissions by 33% by 2030. These goals are being integrated into Teva’s corporate strategy, with some directly linked to executive compensation.

Additionally, Teva outlined the company’s achievements in 2020. Full details of the achievements can be found here.

Lilly

Lilly also outlined its newly updated ESG strategy and launched a new comprehensive resource to provide transparency around the company’s ESG goals and progress.

Lilly’s focus areas for ESG include access and affordability, diversity and inclusion, community engagement, employee well-being, human rights, patient safety, climate, waste, water, product stewardship, corporate governance, business ethics, and supply-chain management.

The company outlined the following: (1) its climate goals through a commitment to renewable electricity and achieving carbon neutrality; (2) waste goals aimed at achieving zero waste to landfill with a focus on reducing plastic waste and increasing recycling; and (3) water goals to protect water-stressed areas and waterways from harmful discharges. Full highlights of Lilly’s ESG commitments can be found here.

Lilly is also adopting standard ESG reporting frameworks from the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board and the Taskforce on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures.

Separately, Lilly announced its support of Direct Relief’s Fund for Health Equity with a $5-million commitment over the next five years (as reported on May 3, 2021). The fund launched in March 2020 with $75 million raised against a goal of $150 million.

Direct Relief, a humanitarian organization, established the fund to improve health in underserved communities in the US by providing financial support to health centers, free and charitable clinics, and other community-based organizations and educational institutions.

The $5-million commitment by Lilly is a component of the company’s Racial Justice Initiative, an endeavor to deliver resource such as education, healthcare, economic stability, and jobs within the communities where Lilly operates.

Viatris

Viatris released its inaugural sustainability report, which provides an enterprise-wide overview of the company’s operations as they relate to ESG matters.

The report outlines efforts from the past year across five key areas of impact: (1) patient health; (2) employee health; (3) environmental health; (4) global public health; and (5) community health. The report also includes a look at Viatris’ role in addressing COVID-19. Among its environmental goals are increasing the use of renewable energy by more than 400% in five years and achieving zero-waste to-landfill at two additional facilities in India to bring its global total to 13 sites with this status. Full details of the report can be found here.

Source: Teva, Eli Lilly and Company (sustainability) Eli Lilly and Company (health equity), and Viatris