According to Sarbib, the World Bank commissioned a poll taken among foreign entrepreneurs who intended to work in Russia. He said that 93% of the respondents knew about the HIV problem in Russia, but only 3% of them realized negative consequences were involved.
Sarbib underscored the necessity of grasping the situation, since a company's expenditures could be very serious as a result of the spread of the HIV infection rate.
According to World Bank research, if Russia does not take effective preventive measures, the infection rate may considerably increase in the next few years from 1.2 million in 2002 to 2.3 million in 2010, and then to 5.4 million in 2020.
However, even with 1% HIV infection rate, the death rate according to World Bank estimations, may increase from this year's rate of 500 people per month to 21,000 in 2020.
If the number of infections reaches 2-3%, the 2010 GDP could shrink by 4.5% and in 2020 losses could reach 10.5%. The volume of investments in this case would then decrease even more substantially than the volume of production. The drop would total 5.5% in 2010 and 14.5% in 2020.
