[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 34, Number 14 (Monday, April 6, 1998)]
[Pages 547-549]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Proclamation 7075--Cancer Control Month, 1998

March 31, 1998

By the President of the United States

of America

A Proclamation

    While cancer still casts a shadow over the lives of millions of 
Americans and their families, we can rightfully look back over the 1990s 
as the decade in which we measurably began to turn the tide against this 
deadly disease. From 1990 to 1995, the annual number of new cancer cases 
for every 100,000 Americans dropped slightly but continuously. Perhaps 
more important, the overall cancer death rate, which rose through the 
1970s and 1980s, declined between 1991 and 1995, a trend that continues 
today and that we hope will be sustained into the next century. Thanks 
to years of dedicated, rigorous scientific study, people with cancer are 
now leading longer, healthier lives. More than eight million Americans 
living today have had cancer at some time, and these survivors are

[[Page 548]]

a powerful reminder of the importance of maintaining our progress in 
cancer research, prevention, and control.
    My Administration's new cancer initiative proposes an unprecedented 
$4.7 billion investment in cancer research through the National 
Institutes of Health (NIH) over the next 5 years. This significant 
increase in research funding has great potential to enhance early 
detection and diagnoses of cancer, to speed the discovery and 
development of new treatments, and to provide all cancer patients and 
their caregivers with improved access to the latest information about 
their disease. Part of these increased funds will go to NIH's Human 
Genome Project, which is helping to advance our knowledge in the 
promising field of cancer genetics. The National Cancer Institute's 
(NCI) recently unveiled Cancer Genome Anatomy Project website is 
connecting researchers to information on genetic factors that determine 
how a particular cancer behaves--how fast it grows, whether it will 
spread, and whether it will respond to treatment--as they work to 
develop new ways to prevent, diagnose, and treat cancer.
    We are also continuing our aggressive cancer prevention efforts. The 
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is entering the eighth year 
of its landmark National Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection 
program. This program brings critical breast and cervical cancer 
screening services to previously underserved women, including older 
women, uninsured or underinsured women, women with low incomes, and 
women of racial and ethnic minority groups. Medicare now provides 
coverage for annual mammography screening and for Pap tests, pelvic 
exams, and colorectal cancer screening. By January 2000, Medicare will 
also cover the costs of prostate cancer screening tests.
    We are taking other important steps toward cancer control as well. 
The NCI and the Food and Drug Administration are working in partnership 
to ensure that potentially effective drugs are expedited through the 
development process so that new anticancer therapies can be made 
available more rapidly to the patients who need them. We are also 
proposing, as part of our new cancer initiative, that Medicare 
beneficiaries have the opportunity to participate in certain cancer 
clinical trials. This will allow patients to benefit from cutting-edge 
research and provide scientists with a larger pool of participants in 
their studies, helping to make the results more statistically meaningful 
and scientifically sound.
    If we follow our present course--investing in research, translating 
research findings into medical practice, and increasing access to 
improved diagnostic and treatment programs--we can continue to make 
significant progress in our crusade against cancer. We must not slacken 
our efforts until we can fully control this devastating disease and 
ultimately eradicate it.
    In 1938, the Congress of the United States passed a joint resolution 
requesting the President to issue an annual proclamation declaring April 
as ``Cancer Control Month.''
    Now, Therefore, I, William J. Clinton, President of the United 
States of America, do hereby proclaim April 1998 as Cancer Control 
Month. I invite the Governors of the 50 States and the Commonwealth of 
Puerto Rico, the Mayor of the District of Columbia, and the appropriate 
officials of all other areas under the American flag to issue similar 
proclamations. I also call upon health care professionals, private 
industry, community groups, insurance companies, and all interested 
organizations and individuals to unite in reaffirming our Nation's 
continuing commitment to controlling cancer.
    In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this thirty-first 
day of March, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and ninety-eight, 
and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred 
and twenty-second.
                                            William J. Clinton

[Filed with the Office of the Federal Register, 11:52 a.m., April 1, 
1998]

Note: This proclamation was published in the Federal Register on April 
2.

[[Page 549]]