National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, 2001

Proclamation 7477 of October 3, 2001

National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, 2001

By the President of the United States of America

A Proclamation

This October, as we mark the 12th observance of
National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, we renew our
commitment to the struggle against breast cancer and
salute the courage of Americans living with this
serious disease. The effects of breast cancer have
touched many of us, whether through personal diagnosis
or the diagnosis of a family member or friend.

We may know someone who has survived breast cancer due
to early detection and improved treatment.
Unfortunately, we also know that a cure cannot come
soon enough. This year, approximately 192,000 women
will be diagnosed with breast cancer. By increasing
awareness about the importance of early detection and
accelerating the use of recent innovative advances in
medical research, we can reduce the incidence of breast
cancer in our Nation.

Until a cure is found, health care professionals agree
that regular mammograms are essential to ensuring the
early detection of breast cancer. The good news is that
the message about early detection is being heard. In
1998, almost 70 percent of women age 40 and older had a
mammogram in the last two years. And this year,
Medicare coverage was expanded to include digital
mammograms, offering women another approach for early
detection.

As the primary agency in the United States for cancer
research, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) leads the
research efforts to find a cure for this disease. Our
goal is a future free of breast cancer. We will achieve
this goal by developing new treatments and therapies
and by better understanding what causes breast cancer.
The NCI will spend an estimated $463.8 million on
breast cancer research this year. That figure will
increase to an estimated $510 million next year; and
overall National Institutes of Health (NIH)
expenditures on breast cancer research are slated to
reach $630 million for Fiscal Year 2002. My
Administration supports an increase in spending for the
NIH, of which NCI is a part, and has proposed that, by
2003, funding for NIH be twice what it was in 1998.

I urge all Americans at risk for breast cancer to use
appropriate screenings that can detect it at its
initial stages. Until we find a cure, early detection
is our most essential tool in fighting this disease.
Recent medical successes allow us to say that the war
on breast cancer will succeed.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the
United States of America, by the authority vested in me
by the Constitution and laws of the United States, do
hereby proclaim October 2001, as National Breast Cancer
Awareness Month. I call upon government officials,
businesses, communities, health care professionals,
educators, volunteers, and all the people of the United
States to publicly reaffirm our Nation's strong and
continuing commitment to controlling and curing breast
cancer.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
third day of October, in the year of our Lord two
thousand one, and of the Independence of the United
States of America the two hundred and twenty-sixth.

(Presidential Sig.)B