A DECADE OF PROMISE

On the occasion of our tenth anniversary, the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation is at an important crossroads. We have accomplished much in our short history, earning a national reputation for championing the rights of children and families struggling with pediatric AIDS. We have initiated and funded important research, causing the government to focus on these issues as well. Our efforts have influenced the pharmaceutical industry to develop, test and make available drugs for children. And along the way, we have worked hard to keep our administrative overhead low to ensure the greatest possible translation of money into research.

Yet as we enter our second decade, we are facing battles on two fronts. Today, there is greater competition among charitable and research organizations for financial support, pointing to the need for more collaboration and pooled resources in the medical arena. And, even more alarmingly, there is complacency in our nation that pediatric AIDS - and AIDS in general -has become a manageable disease. In fact, as pediatric AIDS patients age, we don’t know how effective existing drugs will be. And while the number of infected children may be declining, the number of infected adolescent women is drastically on the rise. That’s only here at home. Throughout the rest of the world, the HIV epidemic runs unabated and largely unpublicized.

Fortunately, the Foundation has a valuable legacy in the integrity and efficiency with which it has pursued us goals, and in its innovation and application of a wide range of research. Our success is based on a simple premise -- that scientists from our nation and the world can have a greater impact as a group than as individuals.

Collaboration - joining together and sharing resources - is the future for the world, and for the Foundation. Already, we see it in business and science, and it is only a matter of time before we see it more fully in medicine. To get an idea of the importance of collaboration, I asked some of our scientists to what extent research about AIDS may contribute to knowledge about other diseases. The answer is that the impact is great, with one discovery often exerting a ripple effect upon others. This underscores the importance of our efforts and why they must continue. Yet public awareness of these compounded contributions is dramatically low, raising new issues for public health education and new challenges for the future.

For the last ten years, the Foundation has dedicated its mission and resources to children. We have become champions, but keepers of the faith ... Faith that brings with it hope that research will lead the way to more treatment options, to a vaccine that will protect against infection, and eventually to a cure . . . Faith that research in pediatric AIDS will have far-reaching implications for other childhood diseases as well.

Today, we stand on the edge of opportunity, with a decade of promise before us. We invite you, our supporters, to help us make the leap into the future where we know we can make a difference. With your help, we can continue to show our conviction and belief that nothing could ever be a more worthwhile gift – to ourselves and to our children – than our desire to help and to heal, and our willingness to do whatever is necessary to accomplish these goals.

Thank you.

//s// Paul