Changing lives with compassion
Diana discovered her true calling when she realised her unique power to make a positive difference in the lives of those in need
IT WAS a simple act but a truly transformative moment in the public life of Diana, Princesss of Wales. A brief handshake with an AIDS patient at Middlesex hospital in 1987 sparked a radical change in society’s attitudes towards the disease.
Her gesture had a genuine worldwide impact. I remember talking to Ahmed Kathrada, who was a political prisoner alongside Nelson Mandela, as he recalled Mandela’s reaction.
He was still in a Cape Town jail and saw Diana’s historic handshake on prison TV. The man who was to become South Africa’s first black president was so moved by Diana’s humanitarian act that he gathered together his fellow prisoners and they embraced those inmates suffering from AIDS who were then segregated from other prisoners.
The response though was not quite so generous at Buckingham Palace, with the Queen and her senior courtiers dismayed that a senior member of the Royal Family had become involved in such a controversial subject as AIDS which, at that time, was an incurable illness primarily associated with the gay community.
This episode however marked a significant change for Diana. She now realised that she could use her public persona as a force both for change and for good.
It set her on a path where she regularly and privately visited the diseased and the dying in hospitals and hospices.
Whatever the Queen might think, from this time onwards Diana began to champion the causes of those who were dispossessed and isolated in society. In short she had found her royal vocation.
From her personal perspective this emotional interaction was also a kind of consolation, receiving love and affection from those often making their final journey, all the while knowing that she was returning to yet another night alone at Kensington Palace.
As her confidence in herself grew, she became more daring. During a hospital visit with US First Lady Barbara Bush she hugged a young man as he lay dying in his bed.
“He was crying his eyes out and clung on to my hand and I felt so comfortable in there,” she later told me.
“I just hated being taken away.”
During the 1990s, when she was detached from the Royal Family, her philanthropic role took clearer shape as she took on crusades to highlight leprosy, land mines and, of course, AIDS.
She shone a light on forgotten causes and in doing so made the monarchy seem out of touch from the concerns of ordinary people. Diana seemed inclusive, the Royal Family remote.
Though estranged from the monarchy, she was still an inadvertent royal pathfinder, her humanitarian mission now embraced by her sons
Though estranged from the monarchy, she was still an inadvertent royal pathfinder, her humanitarian mission now embraced by her sons.
They too have been unafraid to show their emotions, to take on tricky issues such as mental health and disability. They, like their mother, have shown that a hug and a cuddle are worth any number of worthy speeches. William and Harry are the true torchbearers of her humanitarian calling.
They plan to commemorate their mother’s life with a statue to stand in the public gardens of Kensington Palace so that people can reflect on her life and legacy, a legacy that lives on in her children.
As Harry says: “I hope she is looking down with tears in her eyes being incredibly proud of what we’ve established.”
They have ensured that while Diana is gone, she is certainly not forgotten.