[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 43 (Tuesday, March 29, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E543-E544]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      TRIBUTE TO ELIZABETH TAYLOR

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. HENRY A. WAXMAN

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                        Tuesday, March 29, 2011

  Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Speaker, with the passing of Elizabeth Taylor last 
week, America, and the world, lost much more than a great movie 
actress, more than a celebrated legend and cherished celebrity, and 
more than a woman of enduring beauty and appeal.
  We lost a champion fighter for the survival and dignity of those with 
HIV/AIDS.
  Of many causes which Elizabeth Taylor embraced, such as her support 
for the State of Israel and the Jewish people, it was her great courage 
and selfless commitment that defined her work to support every effort 
to find a cure for HIV/AIDS, and to protect the rights of every person 
living with HIV/AIDS.
  We forget how long and hard the struggle has been--precisely because 
of the heroic progress that has been made, medically and socially, in 
treating and living with HIV/AIDS. It's hard to remember, but in the 
early 1980s, people knew very little about AIDS. The nation went on a 
publicity roller-coaster, going from complacency to panic and back 
again.

[[Page E544]]

  She was among a handful of people in those early days of the epidemic 
who managed to get us to the right level of urgency. One, obviously, 
was Surgeon General C. Everett Koop. Another was Tony Fauci at NIH.
  But many people got their most memorable information from an 
unexpected source--Elizabeth Taylor. Beginning with her concern for her 
friends who were sick, she became an ambassador for people living with 
AIDS, for their doctors, and for AIDS research. When the Reagan White 
House was refusing even to acknowledge that tens of thousands of 
Americans were sick and dying, she went public.
  To those who would shun our fellow citizens with HIV/AIDS, Elizabeth 
Taylor literally embraced them--showing us how to respond to a terrible 
illness that exacted a relentless toll on millions.
  And so it was Elizabeth Taylor who called us to account every day, as 
individuals and as a society, for the humanity of those with HIV/AIDS.
  Working with Dr. Mathilde Krim, Elizabeth Taylor championed the 
American Foundation for AIDS Research, a group that advocated for AIDS 
research and found funding for research that no one else was 
financing--functions it serves to this day.
  To her enduring credit, Ms. Taylor leveraged her unique celebrity to 
speak truth to power, going to the media, the Administration, and 
Congress to urge ongoing attention and funding to the epidemic.
  She testified before the Subcommittee on Health and the Environment 
of the House Commerce Committee about the need for research, 
prevention, education and treatment and about the Congress' 
responsibilities to find funds for them. Her efforts helped seal public 
support for the 1990 Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency 
(CARE) Act.
  She was a movie star. But she used her star power to do something 
that scientists, doctors, and public health officials could not have 
accomplished on their own. She made the nation stop, look, listen, and 
understand what was at stake for those with HIV/AIDS and for us as a 
society.
  In this way, Elizabeth Taylor helped motivate us to start doing 
needed work.
  For that we owe her more than movie-star fame. She may be remembered 
most for her screen roles. But it was her living role as a healer for 
which we owe Elizabeth Taylor a debt of profound gratitude--for lives 
improved and lives saved, for advances in treatment and prevention, and 
for the hope of one day finding a cure for HIV/AIDS.

                          ____________________