[Federal Register Volume 59, Number 69 (Monday, April 11, 1994)]
[Presidential Documents]
[Pages 16961-16962]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 94-8725]
[[Page Unknown]]
[Federal Register: April 11, 1994]
Presidential Documents
Federal Register
Vol. 59, No. 69
Monday, April 11, 1994
____________________________________________________________________
Title 3--
The President
Proclamation 6664 of April 7, 1994
Cancer Control Month, 1994
By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation
April 1994 has been designated Cancer Control Month.
For the past 56 years, the President of the United
States, at the request of the Congress, has designated
one month each year to focus public attention on the
progress that we, as a Nation, have made with regard to
this devastating disease. This Proclamation continues
to be a national statement of hope that one day we will
understand, control, and eliminate cancer.
It would be hard to exaggerate the toll cancer exacts.
Each year more than 1 million Americans are diagnosed
with cancer, and nearly one-half that many die of the
disease. We face an awesome challenge in controlling
cancer--one that can be met only through research and
the implementation of research results.
Breast cancer is the most common cancer among American
women and epitomizes the challenge of our mission to
protect and improve women's health. Breast cancer is
widely prevalent and takes a tragically large toll on
women's lives. Yet there are realistic prospects for
its eventual prevention and cure. The strategies used
to foster the translation of scientific knowledge into
clinical innovations toward eradicating breast cancer
also serve as prototypes for the treatment of other
malignancies.
Likewise, prostate cancer is the most frequently
diagnosed cancer among men and the second leading cause
of male cancer deaths. Researchers continue to direct
their efforts toward understanding the biology of this
disease in order to design more effective therapies,
search for more effective screening methods, and
ultimately, prevent its occurrence.
The National Cancer Institute, the American Cancer
Society, and other organizations are intensifying the
effort in cancer prevention research. Programs to
identify environmental and occupational causes of
malignancy continue to be at the forefront of this
research. Current studies address the links between
cancer risks and exposure to pesticides, proximity to
sources of environmental toxins and occupational
carcinogens, air pollution, drinking water
contaminants, and electromagnetic radiation.
We now know that every one of us can join the fight
against cancer. The role played by the public is just
as important as the role played by the most highly
trained scientists. Each of us can adopt a lifestyle
that lowers our chances of getting cancer.
In cancer control, nothing is more important than
understanding and striving to reduce the effects of
smoking, implicated in at least one-third of all cancer
deaths each year. Some 50 million Americans smoke--most
are adults, but a significant number are teenagers.
Smokers bear the brunt of our annual national tragedy
of more than 200,000 cases of lung and mouth cancers
and more than 100,000 cases of pancreatic, kidney, and
bladder cancers. No new drug--no new prevention or
screening technique--would strike as powerful a blow in
our fight against cancer as the single decision by
millions of smokers to quit their habit once and for
all.
Thanks to our progress in cancer research, more than
one-half of the people diagnosed with cancer survive
their disease 5 years or more. Such survival rates were
not even a whispered hope for cancer patients just one
generation ago. The years ahead hold promise of
important advances in the prevention and treatment of
cancer. Together we will continue to work so that fewer
people will have to suffer from cancer and its
aftermath, so that fewer lives will be jeopardized, and
so that fewer people will lose their loved ones to this
disease.
In 1938, the Congress passed a joint resolution (52
Stat. 148; 36 U.S.C. 150) 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 1994
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 ask health care
professionals, private industry, advocacy groups,
community groups, insurance companies, and all other
interested organizations and individual citizens to
unite during this month to publicly reaffirm our
Nation's continuing commitment to controlling cancer.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
seventh day of April, in the year of our Lord nineteen
hundred and ninety-four, and of the Independence of the
United States of America the two hundred and
eighteenth.
(Presidential Sig.)>
[FR Doc. 94-8725
Filed 4-7-94; 12:25 pm]
Billing code 3195-01-P
