Mary Woodward Lasker Award
for Public Service

After the Awards Luncheon, Christopher Reeve comments on winning the 2003 Mary Woodard Lasker Award for Public Service for his perceptive, sustained, and heroic advocacy for medical research in general, and victims of disability in particular, on September 19, 2003.

WHAT DOES BEING RECOGNIZED FOR LASKER AWARD MEAN?

The Lasker Award is one of the highest honors in the country. For the scientists who are awarded, it's known as America's Nobel Prize. In fact, I think some 66 Awardees over the years have gone on to win Nobel Prizes. But the public service part of it is really probably equally as prestigious, and I'm very grateful for being honored for public advocacy public service. And as I've said before, this is a real motivation to be even more of a thorn in the side of the scientists than I have been before. Mary Lasker herself was that way. She was always saying, why, why can't we do more? Why can't we do it more rapidly? Why can't we really help patients and get to get clinical work? So I had the privilege of knowing Mary Lasker in the 1970s, and to receive this award now is really fantastic.

STEM CELL RESEARCH

I believe that there should be a Federal Policy which actually has been adopted in California which allows scientists there to conduct research on stem cells derived from any source. The Federal Government has not passed that kind of a law; in fact there is no public policy. And I hope that that will change.

FROM PATIENT TO ACTIVIST

After I was injured in May of 1995, the next five months were all about survival. Literally staying alive and trying to stop the breakdown of various systems in my body. But by November-December of 1995, I was ready to look to the outside world. And I really owe the beginnings of my activism to Dr. Weiss Young, who is a director of a clinical research facility at Rutgers University today. He came to visit me at the Kessler rehab center in New Jersey, and he said, "You know, you have an important role to play." And we started discussions from there.

ACTIVIST ACTOR

When I was an actor, I was actually the President of a group called the Creative Coalition. We advocated for more funding for the National Endowment for the Arts and for the environment, so in fact I did testify a number of times on the Hill. Perhaps the most important year was 1990, when Jesse Helms and his associates wanted to actually vote the National Endowment for the Arts out of existence, and we were—well, we were helpful in saving the NEA, and I think that was the most dramatic example of actually being able to make a difference. My political or my adversary career has gone on from there. So what I did was, I had not been involved with health care before, but with the experience that I had gained before the accident, I simply shifted roles into me being a patient advocate.

MESSAGE TO YOUNG PEOPLE

My message to young people about finding a political passion and getting involved is that it is so necessary, because the way the political system works right now, it's so full of compromises. Compromises caused by money, by special interest groups. Politicians can't vote their conscience very often because they won't get reelected. So what young people can do is speak up for what's right. To really learn about the issues. First of all, you've got to educate yourself, because if you don't know what's going on, you can't do anything to help anybody. So first learn the issues, know the issues, get fired up about it, make a real, real demand of your elected officials to stand up and vote their conscience.

These politicians need a safety net, and a safety net is in numbers. So when there's a grass roots movement which can be started by young people and in fact by people of all ages, then they're forced to respond. Then we can get things done.

GOALS FOR THE FUTURE

My goals for the future are to ensure the health and welfare of my family, to progress as far as I can in my own recovery, and also to help people who aren't getting the rehabilitation or the medical services that they need. My job is to speak up for people who are never going to be heard, and I'm in a unique position as a patient advocate with access to the media and also to the scientists and to politicians, to try to be at the intersection of those groups, to move the field forward. And I truly believe that nothing is impossible. That with the brain power that we have in this country and with the resources that we have in this country, we can really harness that potential and change a lot of lives. There are millions and millions of people suffering now for whom we can really finally actually do something. My job in the future is to do the best I can to make it happen.