Proclamation 4920—National Medic Alert Week

Emergency medical care is as effective as the support it receives from our citizens. When we contribute to the lifesaving capabilities of rescue workers and other health professionals, we help to assure our own prospects for continued good health.

About forty million Americans are afflicted with medical problems which are difficult to identify in an emergency situation. One simple but important step that people with special medical problems can take to protect themselves and to enhance the effectiveness of emergency medical care is to register with a medic alert service.

For nearly 25 years, these special identification and information services have been helping health and rescue personnel meet the unique emergency needs of people with diabetes, heart conditions, epilepsy, allergies and other hidden medical problems. The medic alert tag that the victim of a medical emergency wears and the information service with which that person is registered can spell the difference between survival and death. Each year, medical alert identification and emergency information systems save the lives of more than two thousand people who have hidden medical conditions.

To increase awareness among Americans of the benefits of these emergency services, the Congress, by House Joint Resolution 272, requested that the President issue a proclamation designating April 4 through April 10, 1982, as National Medic Alert Week.

Now, Therefore, I, Ronald Reagan, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim the week beginning April 4, 1982, as National Medic Alert Week. I urge all citizens, associations, and organizations to observe this week with activities that foster the use of emergency identification and information services. I invite the Governors of the States and local government officials to give their support to these activities. Medic alert services save lives.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this 3rd day of April, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty two, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and sixth.

RONALD REAGAN