With Much Ado, Liz Taylor Pleads for AIDS Research

Actress Elizabeth Taylor, with the clicking of cameras drowning out her testimony and her sixth ex-husband looking on, today urged a Senate subcommittee to greatly expand the amount of money the government spends to find a cure for the deadly AIDS disease.

“Since my friend Rock Hudson died of AIDS last year I have worked with the American Foundation for AIDS Research. . . . I have become familiar with the tragedy of AIDS and I am acutely aware of research funding needs,” she told the Senate Appropriations labor and health subcommittee.

“A comprehensive, sustained basic research effort will pay off in many ways,” she said. “It will greatly increase our ability to understand, prevent and treat not only cancer and AIDS but many other intractable chronic diseases such as arthritis and multiple sclerosis, which--like AIDS--involve virus-induced malfunctions of the immune system.”

A Nod for Ex-Husband

Taylor, photographed repeatedly by about 25 news photographers who crowded into the small hearing room, exchanged nods with Sen. John W. Warner (R-Va.), a former husband, when he sat at the conference table toward the end of her testimony.

Sen. Lowell P. Weicker Jr. (R-Conn.), the panel’s chairman, noted the crush of photographers standing behind him to take pictures of Taylor. “I haven’t seen anything like this in the 30 days we have had hearings,” Weicker said. “Given the option between beauty and power, I’d rather have beauty.”

“You best exemplify the best use of power in the sense of your being well-loved and well-known throughout the country, using that power on behalf of those that need help,” Weicker said.

He decried budgetary pressures that he said forced him and other members of the subcommittee to “grovel” to maintain current spending levels for the National Institutes of Health in the 1987 budget while the Defense Department received an extra $5 billion.

Warner Passes

When it came Warner’s turn to question the witness, he said: “I’ll pass, Mr. Chairman. I’m in charge of the defense budget.” Warner is a former secretary of the Navy.

Weicker joked about reallocating $100 million from the defense budget for health research during the appropriations process. “Let’s work it out together,” Warner replied, “and don’t send a lobbyist to see me.”

“She is coming to lunch and you two gents are invited,” Warner said, referring to his colleagues.

“John, we’ll talk later,” Taylor said with mock sternness in her voice.