Clinton Outlines Two New Cancer Initiatives

WASHINGTON--On the day of The March, President Clinton announced two new cancer initiatives and issued a challenge to cancer researchers that sounded more like a "Mission Impossible" assignment.

The President said that all federal cancer research programs will "by next year, fully integrate patients and advocates into the process of setting research priorities."

He also directed the National Cancer Institute to speed development of a national clinical trials program and to make it "a simple, accessible resource for health care providers and patients across our nation."

Mr. Clinton then challenged scientists "to develop, by the year 2000, new diagnostic techniques for every major kind of cancer so we catch it at its earliest and often most treatable stage."