Counting Condoms in the Congo

Starting after the first of the year Westlake Pharmaceutical begins to receive the first of over 150 applications from those wishing to be accepted into their 9 week summer internship program. From these applications, the company will accept only 12 into the program. Internships are a two way street; the company creates a pool of potential employees and the student has access to the staff’s brain power.  Underneath it all however,is the one feature the students relish the most; as far as ones resume’ is concerned an intern, at Westlake is the same as being selected to attend Harvard’s summer school.

Joseph Westlake, an English physician, started his company 136 years ago. He was one of the first to create the idea of a geriatric drug. Through the years he became well know for the research staff he organized. This group developed many ways to create generic drugs once the protective patents expired. As their research went on, the company suddenly found it self in a  new field of research, a method to attacking the HIV/AIDS virus. Knowing the cost factors such research would require, Westlake sought , and received, a grant of $15,000,000 from the UN and US government.

A new department was established by Westlake under the direction of Dr. William Westlake, grandson of Joseph. It would be his responsibility to design the program which would be the basis of this assault on the HIV/AIDS virus. After much thought he felt this would be a great opportunity to take advantage of Westlake’s well respected summer intern program. Of the 150 applications that were received, Dr. Westlake chose 25 to be invited to the session. This would give him time to study the group with the hope of finding 12 that he could select to use as a beginning base to established the new training program.

During this selection process, Westlake began construction of a research lab in Johannesburg, South Africa. This would be the base of training and research for the first contingency of trainees brought over from America. Without going into great detail he explained to the class that they could be a part of an international research program. For the next 9 weeks they would study the history of the African Continent and the impact the HIV/AIDS virus had in its population. At the same time he would be studying each intern trying to find those most likely to be a candidate trainee to be sent to the South African laboratory.