Patricia Taylor

Patricia Elsie Taylor (; March 20, 1929 – September 9, 2024) was an Australian-born Canadian microbiologist and virologist best-known for her role in the Canadian Caper during the 1979 Iranian revolution. As a scientist, she published over 100 scientific papers on tropical diseases, viral infections and the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Taylor was appointed to the Order of Canada for her efforts in aiding six American diplomats to escape Iran during the Iran hostage crisis along with her diplomat husband Kenneth D. Taylor, who was then the Canadian ambassador to Iran.

Early life Taylor was born Patricia Elsie Lee on March 20, 1929, in Ayr, Queensland, Australia, to Mayzie Kwong Sue Duk and Ernest Howard Lee Hang Gong, in a Chinese immigrant family. She was sixth in the family of eleven children and was raised in the town of Townsville. Lee worked in the family's grocery store while continuing to pursue music and ballet. She completed her undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in science at the University of Queensland, where she studied under Australian virologist and microbiologist Macfarlane Burnet. She later went to the United States and obtained a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley. Her research during this time focused on studying the relation between malnutrition and inflammatory responses.

Career

Microbiologist Taylor began her research career at Berkeley where she studied encephalitis and the impact of malnutrition on immune response.

When Taylor returned to New York, she worked in the front lines of the then emerging HIV/AIDS epidemic working with the New York Blood Center's Lindsley F. Kimball Research Institute. Her work during this period contributed to the understanding of viral infections and specifically of HIV/AIDS when the medical community was still coming to terms with the complexity of the disease.

Taylor not only helped keep the diplomats' presence a secret but also participated in the plan to smuggle them out of the country using false Canadian passports. The operation, devised with assistance from the CIA, succeeded in getting the Americans out of Iran in January 1980. The event later became the subject of multiple films, including the Academy Award–winning Argo (2012).

Taylor was made a member of the Order of Canada in 1981. The citation called out her work as a research microbiologist and her role in the Iranian crisis and efforts in aiding the escape of six American diplomats from that country. In 1992, Taylor was named Woman of the Year by the Canadian Women's Club in New York. Her husband predeceased her in 2015. She returned to Canada, settling in Ottawa, Ontario, after her husband's death. American actress Page Leong portrayed her character in the 2012 Academy Award–winning film Argo