JEANNE MESERVE, CNN ANCHOR: In medical news, the struggle to balance the emerging field of genetic testing with a patient's right to privacy. President Clinton will issue an executive order today to quell fears that genetic test results pointing to the potential for serious illness could be used against you in the workplace. CNN White House correspondent Chris Black has more on this story -- Chris.</s>CHRIS BLACK, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Jeanne, just minutes from now President Clinton will sign an executive order that forbids the federal government from using genetic testing to discriminate against any of its employees. The order forbids any federal agency from using genetic testing in any hiring or promotion decisions. Although it only covers 1.8 million federal employees, White House officials say the president hopes that the private business sector will follow suit. White House officials say that the brave new world of genetic testing opens up all sorts of potential problems for workers, because genetic testing can show a propensity towards developing all kinds of diseases, from alcoholism to cancer, and the fear is that employers will use this testing to screen potential employees and not hire them on the basis of the fact that they may eventually get sick and cause the employer some extra money in insurance premiums or in loss of productivity. The president is fascinated by the human genome project. He talks about it all the time. And in the last two State of the Union Addresses he promised that he would do something about this. Today he takes the first step. His spokesman, Joe Lockhart, said that the president hopes that the federal government, as the largest employer in the United States, will send a powerful message to corporate America -- Jeanne.</s>MESERVE: Chris Black at the White House, thank you.
President Clinton to Sign Order Forbidding Genetic Discrimination in Federal Workplace