Proclamation 5454

by Ronald Reagan

By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation

World Health Day, which marks the founding of the World Health Organization, serves to remind us that good health is a priceless treasure and that recent advances in the sciences of medicine, nutrition, hygiene, public health, and immunology make the possession of that treasure possible for more people than ever before.

The theme for World Health Day 1986, "Healthy Living: Everyone a Winner," emphasizes the positive steps that individuals and communities can take to protect and promote health. In furtherance of the global goal of Health for All by the Year 2000, the World Health Organization and its member governments are stressing the benefits that come from healthful patterns of living, with particular attention to exercise, nutrition, and the avoidance of such destructive habits as smoking and the abuse of alcohol and drugs.

In recent years, health leaders and private physicians in the United States have emphasized how much each person can do to maintain good health by a regimen of good diet, proper exercise, and the avoidance of substance abuse. This campaign is beginning to bear fruit, and the United States is experiencing encouraging reductions in the incidence of heart disease and stroke.

It is appropriate that as all member governments commemorate World Health Day, we should join other members of the World Health Organization in promoting healthful living and physical fitness and in pledging our continued support to improving the health of all the people who inhabit this planet.

The Congress, by Senate Joint Resolution 226, has designated the week of April 6 through April 12, 1986, as "World Health Week," and April 7, 1986, as "World Health Day," and has authorized and requested the President to issue a proclamation in observance of these events.

Now, Therefore, I, Ronald Reagan, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim the week of April 6 through April 12, 1986, as World Health Week, and April 7, 1986, as World Health Day. I call upon the people of the United States to observe this week with appropriate programs and activities and by resolving to attend to personal health through good nutrition, appropriate physical exercise, and the avoidance of such unhealthful practices as smoking and abuse of alcohol and drugs.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this seventh day of April, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty-six, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and tenth.

RONALD REAGAN

[Filed with the Office of the Federal Register, 10:58 a.m., April 8, 1986]