The pharmaceutical industry Demo S.A. was honoured with two Golden Awards in the pharmaceutical companies category at the ‘Healthcare Business Awards 2017’, which were organised for the 2nd year by Health Daily and Boussias Communications, and took place on Wednesday, 13 September at the Divani Apollon Palace and Thalasso.
The awards ceremony – which showcased and rewarded business excellence, innovation, development initiatives and best practices in businesses, institutions, and organisations in the healthcare sector – was attended by over 400distinguished representatives from the field.
Demo was awarded one Golden Award in the Extroversion category (International Sales), and another Gold in the Social Responsibility category. The award was accepted on behalf of Demo’s board of directors by Ioanna Demos, who, among other things, stated: ‘The international successes of our company came as the culmination of the hard work of the Export Department, to which, on behalf of Demo’s board of directors, I would like to extend our most sincere thanks today and to which I would like to dedicate this award, as well as to all the departments who worked to achieve quality and to meet the needs of patients all over the world.
In closing, I would like to remind you that at this event last year the president and founder of Demo, Stavros Demos, was recognised for his many years of service to the pharmaceutical sector. When he received his award, he said just one phrase. It is with that phrase that I would like to finish today, ‘Our greatest satisfaction is when the Greek flag and Greek medicines are depicted on the boxes of the medicines and reach all the countries worldwide’.
When she received the Gold award for social responsibility, she also stated that, ‘For Demo, the most important pillar of development was, from the day we started, the human. Human – as an employee. Human – as a patient. Human – as a citizen. Today, Demo employs 850 workers. It should be noted that since 2011, when the economic downturn in Greece essentially began, not only has Demo not laid staff off and reduced its workforce but, on the contrary, has continued to create new jobs and employment opportunities.
‘Our mission is great and began a long time ago’, continued Ms Demou, ‘as we have always contributed to the institutions and organisations in the health sector and also to vulnerable social groups. Throughout our history of community service, we have met associations and organisations consisting of very worthy people with very worthy causes, but at the heart of Demo’s social awareness is the volunteer work of its staff, with a blood bank, a marathon team, a children’s theatre group for hospitals, etc. A great “well done!” to all the staff of the Health and Safety Departments as well as the Communications Department. In closing I would like to say that even Demo’s production process is always at the service of every human life. The company produces specially formulated pharmaceuticals to order for rare individual, even for a single patient, following special licencing. Demo’s ability to halt a production line, producing 15,000 vials per hour for an entire 8-hour shift, in order to produce 20 or 30 vials that might save one human life is perhaps the most important measure of Demo’s commitment to social responsibility’.
The award for extroversion was presented to Demo by Nikos Vettas, Professor of Economics at the Economic University of Athens and General Director of the Foundation for Economic and Industrial Research, and the award for social awareness by Theodoros Karoutzos, Managing Director of Affidea Euroiatriki Hellas.