Improving Lives and Communities

As the nation's largest healthcare services company, McKesson is dedicated to building healthier communities. Every day, our products and services enable our customers to improve patients' lives worldwide.

McKesson is America's oldest and largest healthcare services company, with our pharmaceutical wholesaling roots dating back more than 175 years. In fact, we created the first national drug distribution system. We're dedicated to delivering vital medicines, medical supplies and healthcare information technology solutions that touch the lives of patients in every healthcare setting.

As a Fortune 15 company, we impact communities through sheer economic opportunity. Headquartered in San Francisco, Calif., McKesson provides employment to more than 32,000 people across the nation and around the world. We bring business into the communities where we operate and provide fair compensation and generous benefits for our employees.

Supporting Small and Minority-owned Businesses

McKesson recognizes the outstanding contributions made by small and diverse businesses to the economic health and diversity of communities throughout the United States. We are committed to expanding partnership opportunities through our supplier diversity efforts by supporting sourcing opportunities with small, disadvantaged, historically underutilized, minority-owned, women-owned, veteran-owned, service-disabled and Historically Underutilized Business Zones (HUB) businesses, as well as Ability One programs.

McKesson also offers minority-owned and women-owned small business healthcare suppliers the opportunity to enter into a mentoring relationship. Since 1994, these relationships have provided small business suppliers with extraordinary marketing and business management guidance, enabling them to expand their sales within the nation's healthcare supply chain.

Building Healthier Communities

McKesson also gives back to communities in ways that go well beyond the economic impact generated by our business operations. Established in 1943, the McKesson Foundation invests in nonprofit organizations working to improve the communities where we live and work. In Fiscal Years 2008 and 2009, the McKesson Foundation donated nearly $10 million, primarily to healthcare-related nonprofit organizations and to support our employees' community involvement efforts.

With the start of Fiscal Year 2010, the McKesson Foundation refined its strategic focus. In addition to our continued commitment to supporting our employees' community involvement efforts, the Foundation's grantmaking will support chronic disease management, beginning with a three-year emphasis on diabetes management.

By focusing on chronic disease management, we will be able to invest in innovative nonprofit programs, lend our institutional expertise to our partner organizations and track the specific health impacts of our community investment efforts.

To create more synergy between our community investment programs, we have also focused our employee involvement programs on diabetes. Most notably, in addition to ongoing support for employee involvement in the community, we are aligning our annual Community Days event with the McKesson Foundation's focus area. Our annual walk events around the country will also support the diabetes cause.

Community Days: A Long Tradition of Service

Our hallmark volunteering event, Community Days is a McKesson tradition that began more than a decade ago. In the spring each year, thousands of our employees gather to work on projects in service to their communities. Our Fiscal Year 2008 project benefited foster youth and in Fiscal Year 2009, our efforts supported pediatric oncology patients. In Fiscal Year 2010, Community Days focused on a project supporting hospitalized military veterans.

We are pleased to see continued employee interest in participating in Community Days, with strong growth over the past several years, when we formally launched an expansion beyond our headquarters location in San Francisco.

Caregiver Kits: Another Way to Help End Suffering

As a healthcare company, McKesson is in the unique position of operating within an industry that aims to end suffering. Since 2006, McKesson has partnered with humanitarian organization World Vision to provide more than 175,000 World Vision Caregiver Kits to local community caregivers who care for those living with AIDS in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

The kits include items AIDS caregivers say they need most, from cotton balls to antibacterial soap, washcloths, petroleum jelly and antifungal cream.

Our company's expertise and infrastructure in distributing medical-surgical supplies have allowed us to negotiate dramatic discounts with our suppliers on the contents of the kits. We pass these savings on to the community groups — schools, churches and businesses — that purchase materials and assemble the kits for World Vision to distribute in remote areas of developing countries.

In addition to securing deep discounts on the medical supplies within the kits, McKesson has supported World Vision's Caregiver Kit program by hosting kit assembly events. At events such as our national sales conference or smaller department outings, thousands of McKesson employees have had the opportunity to directly participate in this unique effort.

In Fall 2008, the Caregiver Kit program gained new prominence as hundreds of delegates and dignitaries from both the U.S. Democratic and Republican parties rolled up their sleeves and assembled World Vision Caregiver Kits at the Democratic and Republican National Conventions. Between the two conventions, delegates and guests built 4,000 caregiver kits.

Responding Quickly to Disasters Makes a Difference

In early September 2008, Hurricane Gustav hit the United States gulf coast, knocking out power to more than a million homes and businesses. With full restoration not expected for up to three weeks, our distribution businesses responded quickly to deliver much-needed medical supplies and pharmaceuticals to our customers serving affected communities in Louisiana and Mississippi.

McKesson Medical-Surgical went to great lengths to support our customers in the region. We chartered a cargo jet to fly supplies from our distribution center in Ontario, Calif., to Texas, and sent additional supplies by ground in a pair of 53-foot tractor-trailers. Daily shipments continued throughout the hurricane's aftermath.

A quick response was possible thanks to a dedicated, around-the-clock Disaster Preparedness Support Team that includes employees across all functions of our business. As far as 10 days in advance of Gustav's landing, operations employees began tracking the storm and coordinating plans in daily conference calls.

Account managers checked in with their customers, offering their support as well as their cell-phone numbers. Additional inventories were moved to distribution centers in the region.

Three days before Gustav came ashore, preparations were in full swing. Contingent accounts were set up for government agencies to use in case of a major emergency. Satellite phones were distributed to key personnel in the field.

Thirty-seven ServiceFirst employees volunteered to work Labor Day weekend, putting in 300 hours making outbound calls and coordinating Tuesday deliveries. Meanwhile, in a McKesson Customer Financial Services facility, customer orders were processed and coordinated.

McKesson plays an important role in helping our customers deliver critical medial supplies and pharmaceuticals during emergencies and natural disasters. In support of our customers' life-saving missions, we are proud that our world-class distribution services, our dedicated employees and our commitment to our ICARE shared principles can come together in service of communities during times of need.