Lilly Employees from Nearly 50 Nations Participate in Company's First-Ever Global Day ...( INDIANAPOLIS May 14 /- Thousands ...)

INDIANAPOLIS, May 14 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Thousands of Eli Lilly and Company employees in nearly 50 nations are rolling up their sleeves today to help address local community needs in celebration of Lilly's first-ever Global Day of Service, possibly the largest corporate volunteer initiative to ever take place on one day.

Beginning at sunrise in New Zealand, Lilly employees from Algeria to Venezuela will be donating time and energy to improve the health and well-being of communities around the world. In Turkey, employees are planting trees to assist with reforestation efforts. In China, employees will walk the Great Wall to raise funds to fight multidrug-resistant tuberculosis. And in Indianapolis, Lilly's headquarters, the company has partnered with Keep Indianapolis Beautiful and more than 50 local community organizations to participate in a massive one-day city makeover.

More than 8,400 Indianapolis-area employees are participating in 60 beautification projects, which include:
-- painting more than a half-mile of outdoor murals, including a

1,230-foot long wall that may create a new Guinness Book of World

Record for the largest paint-by-number mural

-- planting 2,000 trees and 6,000 other plantings

-- enhancing 16 medians

-- removing 24 acres of invasive plants from public areas

-- building Habitat for Humanity house frames for three homes

-- working with 19 local schools (mostly IPS), Boy Scouts of Greater

Indianapolis, Indy Parks and United Way of Central Indiana on other

projects benefiting our central Indiana community

"I can think of no better way to celebrate Lilly's 132nd year in business than this Global Day of Service," said Lilly CEO and President John Lechleiter. "We are dedicated to developing breakthrough products that improve the lives of patients. However, we know that the health of people and, more broadly, of communities, is about more th
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