ANTHONY J. RUCCI TO JOIN CARDINAL HEALTH
AS EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT, HUMAN RESOURCES

Cardinal Health Inc. (NYSE: CAH) announced today it has named Anthony J. Rucci as its executive vice president of human resources, responsible for managing the company's worldwide human resources function. Rucci, 49, will join Cardinal in mid-November from the University of Illinois at Chicago's College of Business Administration, where he is dean.

"Tony will be deeply missed as a colleague and friend. He has done a marvelous job as dean and in forging relationships between the College of Business Administration and the Chicago-area business community," said UIC Interim Chancellor Sylvia Manning.

Elizabeth Hoffman, provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at UIC, said Rucci "has shown a bold vision for the role the college can play in producing future leaders of Chicago-area business."

"He developed a strategic mission for the college and led the planning for a new College of Business Administration building on UIC's South Campus," Hoffman said. "In a short time, he has done much, and for that he has our gratitude and respect."

David Weinberg, chairman of the Business Advisory Council for UIC's College of Business Administration, said those who work with Rucci value his leadership and commitment.

"When you look back over the past year, Tony contributed a great deal to moving the College of Business Administration forward," Weinberg said. "He mapped out a vision and a plan, and he added a new vitality which the students and staff welcome and believe in."

Cardinal Health is a leading provider of services supporting health care worldwide. The company employs more than 35,000 associates on five continents.

"Tony brings to Cardinal a tremendous depth of senior-level leadership experience in health care and retailing, dynamic industries where effective human resources practices are key drivers of business success," said John C. Kane, president and chief operating officer of Cardinal Health. "With Cardinal's rapid growth, geographic breadth and performance-based culture, Tony's role in aligning human resources initiatives with our business goals will be critical here."

Before joining the University of Illinois at Chicago in 1998, Rucci held senior staff and line management positions as a corporate officer of two Fortune 100 companies -- Sears, Roebuck & Co. and Baxter International. Between 1993 and 1998, Rucci was executive vice president for administration at Sears, where he was responsible for human resources and several other functions, including legal, ethics, administrative services and strategic sourcing.

He served as chairman of the board of directors for Sears de Mexico, Sears' publicly traded retail business in Mexico. In addition, Rucci was a director of Sears Canada and Western Auto, and a member of the retail board of Sears' Grupo Carso unit. Sears' cultural and financial recovery during Rucci's tenure was the subject of numerous articles, including a Harvard Business Review article he authored in 1998.

Rucci's experience in the health-care field is extensive. From 1979 to 1993, he held several positions of increasing responsibility in human resources with American Hospital Supply Corp. and Baxter International Inc., which merged with American in 1985. In 1986, he was named to the top human resources post at Baxter and held that position until 1992, when he was named senior vice president for company strategy, business development and external affairs.

"I'm thrilled to return to health care and to join an organization with the superb reputation of Cardinal Health," Rucci said. "I look forward to working with Cardinal's leadership to build on the company's already extraordinary accomplishments. I believe that innovative people-management practices directly create value for customers and investors."

A frequent speaker and author on management and human resources, Rucci was named a fellow of the National Academy of Human Resources in 1995 and Executive of the Year by the International Association of College & Professional Recruiters in 1997. In 1999, Workforce magazine recognized his work at Sears with its annual Optimas Award for general excellence in human resources.

Rucci attended Bowling Green State University, where he received a bachelor's degree in psychology and mathematics, and a master's and doctorate in industrial/organizational psychology.

Cardinal Health Inc., a Fortune 100 corporation based in Dublin, Ohio, is a leading provider of services supporting health care.

Cardinal offers a broad array of complementary products and services to health-care providers and manufacturers to help them improve the efficiency and quality of health care. These services include pharmaceutical distribution (Cardinal Distribution and National Specialty Services Inc.), health-care product manufacturing, distribution and consulting services (Allegiance Corp.), drug delivery systems development (R.P. Scherer Corp.), pharmaceutical packaging and repackaging (PCI Services Inc. and National PharmPak Services Inc.), automated dispensing systems manufacturing (Pyxis Corp.), hospital pharmacy management (Owen Healthcare Inc.), retail pharmacy franchising (Medicine Shoppe International Inc.) and health-care information systems development (Cardinal Information Companies).

The common shares of Cardinal Health Inc. are a component of the Standard & Poor's 500 Index.

With 25,000 students, the University of Illinois at Chicago is the largest and most diverse university in the Chicago area. UIC is home to the largest medical school in the United States and is one of the 88 leading research universities in the country. Located just west of Chicago's Loop, UIC is a vital part of the educational, technological and cultural fabric of the area.

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