Henry Schein named to Fortune 'Change the World' list

Henry Schein Inc. has been named to Fortune magazine's "Change the World" list of companies that exert a positive social impact for an initiative to stem pandemics.

The Long Island distributor of dental and other health care products was named to the annual ranking for its role in co-founding the Pandemic Supply Chain Network years before the outbreak of COVID-19.

The network is a public-private initiative connecting about 60 health care manufacturers and distributors such as Johnson & Johnson and co-founder UPS.

The network's oversight bodies include co-founders the World Health Organization and the World Bank.

Talks at the World Economic Forum held in 2015 at Davos, Switzerland, led to the creation of the PSCN.

The network helps to coordinate operations and share data among the participants when pandemics strike.

In a statement, Henry Schein said that the company's role in the network put it in a position to offer guidelines on properly using personal protective equipments.

"Since our founding in 1932, Henry Schein has been guided by the belief that we can align our strengths as a business with the needs of society to make a positive difference," Stanley M. Bergman, Henry Schein's chairman and chief executive said in a statement.

Melville-based Henry Schein, Long Island's largest public company by revenue, was ranked No. 19 out of 53 companies around the world.

Fortune’s introduction said the sixth annual edition of the list "is built on the premise that the profit motive can inspire companies to tackle society’s unmet needs."

The No. 1 spot went jointly to the scores of companies developing vaccines for COVID-19 around the world, including AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Brisol Myers Squibb and Sanofi.

Rounding out the top 10 were: Alibaba, PayPal, Nvidia, BlackRock, Zoom, Safaricom, Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Walmart and Serum Institute of India.

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By Ken Schachter

kenneth.schachter@newsday.comkschach

Ken Schachter covers corporate news, including technology and aerospace, and other business topics for Newsday. He has also worked at The Miami Herald and The Jerusalem Post.