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Brief Description:

Recently, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, one of the 27 institutes and centers at NIH, was renamed at a ceremony on the NIH campus in Bethesda, Maryland to honor Eunice Kennedy Shriver.

Transcript:

Balintfy: Recently, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, one of the 27 institutes and centers at NIH, was renamed at a ceremony on the NIH campus in Bethesda, Maryland to honor Eunice Kennedy Shriver.

Zerhouni: We're witnessing an event that is illustrative of a fundamental truth.

Balintfy: Dr. Elias Zerhouni is the Director of the NIH.

Zerhouni: History is made by a few leaders with a vision when it's embraced by all of us as a mission. And I think today, we're seeing the vision of a few leaders.

Balintfy: Members of Congress, federal officials, as well as family and friends of Mrs. Shriver at the renaming event, included Senators Edward Kennedy and Orin Hatch, Congressman Steny Hoyer, and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Dr. Duane Alexander is director of the newly renamed institute. He highlights Mrs. Shriver's leadership.

Alexander: In Washington and elsewhere, many good ideas languish unfulfilled. That could have happened with the idea of a new institute if a champion had not come forward to bring it to fruition. That champion was Eunice Kennedy Shriver.

Balintfy: Dr. Alexander explains that in the early 1960s, Mrs. Shriver urged her brother, President John F. Kennedy, to establish an institute that would conduct research on children's health and human development. She later worked with House and Senate leaders to help ensure passage of the legislation that would make the institute a reality. Mrs. Shriver says much, but not all of her life has been spent working to make the world a better place for people with intellectual disability.

Shriver: That has been a huge part of my life. It inspired me to work and research when we were young, to create sports programs with others, Special Olympics and Best Buddies, to ask political leaders for more education, more health care, more housing and more acceptance.

Balintfy: Again, Dr. Zerhouni.

Zerhouni: It is with the greatest pride for all of us at the National Institutes of Health, to witness the change of the name of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development to the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

Balintfy: The NICHD sponsors research on development, before and after birth; maternal, child, and family health; reproductive biology and population issues; and medical rehabilitation. For more information, visit www.nichd.nih.gov. This is Joe Balintfy at the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland.