Suffer Not the Children: Glaser Foundation Revolutionizes Pediatric AIDS Treatment

A few months after her daughter Ariel's death from AIDS in 1988, Elizabeth Glaser, who contracted HIV from blood transfusions in 1981, gathered two close friends together to help her launch the Pediatric AIDS Foundation. Glaser was determined to get her HIV-positive son Jake, 4, access to AIDS drugs then available to adults but untested and unapproved for use in children.

Glaser, wife of actor/writer/director Paul Glaser, used her Hollywood clout to recruit political, health and celebrity personalities to get behind the foundation. David Kessler, chancellor of University of California-San Francisco, was the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration when Glaser made her first trip to Washington. Kessler, who now chairs the foundation's board, said of Glaser, "I've never seen anyone as focused: 'Why aren't you requiring companies to develop drugs for children with AIDS?'"

Jake is now in college and doing well, thanks to improved treatment, said Susie Zeegen, one of the three founders. However, the medicines that saved him came too late for Elizabeth, who died in 1994.

Nov. 28 was the 15-year anniversary of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, and health officials credit it for:

• Prompting Congress in November to impose the pediatric rule requiring drug firms to test all new medicines on children.

• Prevention efforts that have slashed the number of pediatric AIDS cases in the United States by 89 percent since 1992.

• A global "Call to Action" program to extend that achievement to 17 other countries, including South Africa, India and Russia.

• Direct funding for promising young HIV/AIDS researchers.

• The Glaser Pediatric Research Network, which links researchers at five top pediatric medical centers to speed research on a range of other childhood ailments.

• A social calendar of fundraisers that unite donors and celebrities with kids and families. The foundation's assets now total about $32 million, with about $13 million earmarked for programs.

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