Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1997. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.

Reuters NewMedia, Inc.; Monday December 1 7:15 PM EST
Maggie Fox, Health and Science Correspondent

In a declaration marking World AIDS Day, Clinton noted that AIDS was the sixth leading cause of death among people aged 15 to 24, and the biggest cause of death of young black Americans in the same age group.

"The loss of so many young Americans to this terrible epidemic is a threat to this nation and should serve as a call to action," Clinton said in the statement.

"Accordingly I hereby direct that each federal agency, within 90 days, working with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Office on National AIDS Policy, identify all programs under its control that serve young people ages 13 to 21 and that offer a significant opportunity for preventing HIV infection," Clinton said.

He gave the agencies six months to come up with a plan for ways each program could increase access to HIV educational information, as well as support for people with the HIV virus that can develop into AIDS.

"The statistics are heartbreaking," Clinton said in a separate statement. "In America alone, more than 7,500 children under the age of 13 have been diagnosed with AIDS. Every hour of every day, two more Americans under the age of 21 become infected with HIV."

Earlier, first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton joined forces with AIDS campaigners and movie stars to urge that AIDS drugs be tested on children and be made more widely available to them.

They said 25 percent of all new HIV infections in the United States were in people under age 20, and that up to 10 million children around the world would be infected over the next three years.

"AIDS hits children especially hard and children with the virus have fewer treatment options than adults," Mrs. Clinton told supporters of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatrics AIDS Foundation, which gave her an award to mark World AIDS Day.

"We particularly have to remain concerned because some of the latest drugs available to adults are not available to children," Mrs. Clinton added.

In August, President Clinton proposed new Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations that would force drug companies to study the effects of all drugs in children.

The American Academy of Pediatrics says 80 percent of drugs sold in the United States carry no instructions on how to use them in children. Only 42 percent of the drugs most commonly used by children and adolescents have been tested on them.

There are 11 drugs currently available to treat AIDS, but only six of them are approved for children and have special formulations for children.

Use of the drug AZT has prevented many cases of mother-to-baby transmission of HIV, but researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said many more mothers were becoming infected and wiping out such progress.

"Between 1991 and 1995, the number of women diagnosed with AIDS increased by over 60 percent, more than any other group reported with AIDS regardless of race or mode of transmission," Dr. Mary Lou Lindegren of the CDC's AIDS surveillance branch told a forum marking World AIDS Day.

In New York, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said AIDS was the most publicized disease in the world "but its impact on children has received an inadequate response and AIDS programs for children have lagged behind those of adults."

Annan said that by the end of 1997, 1 million children under the age of 15 were expected to be living with HIV, the vast majority of them in developing countries.

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