Listening to music before, after and even during surgery reduces anxiety and the need for painkillers, according to a comprehensive study published Wednesday.

In a review of more than 70 clinical trials involving nearly 7,000 patients, researchers found music to be a powerful analgesic under almost all circumstances.

An Indian court on Thursday overturned a government ban on Nestle's hugely popular Maggi noodles brand, but ordered further tests before the product can go back on sale.

Nestle had gone to the court to challenge the nationwide ban ordered by India's food safety watchdog in June after tests by some states found lead levels exceeded statutory limits.

Africa has marked one year since the last case of recorded polio, with the United Nations celebrating Wednesday a key step towards eradicating the disease.

The last recorded case on the continent was in Somalia in August 11 2014, although health officials must wait two more years before declaring the continent free from the highly infectious, crippling virus.

Drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline shut down a plant in North Carolina Tuesday that produces inhaled medications after discovering the bacteria that causes Legionnaire's disease, a potentially fatal form of pneumonia.

The manufacturing plant in Zebulon, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) east of Raleigh, was closed after routine testing found the bacteria in a self-standing cooling tower. About 400 of the 850 employees who work in Zebulon were told to stay away until the towers are cleaned, officials for the London-based company said.

Amish chicken farmer Ura Gingerich begins each day by lantern light, but his simple life of tradition is threatened by a modern scourge that has devastated the U.S. poultry industry.

More than 48 million turkeys and chickens have either died by the bird flu virus or been killed to stop its spread since it emerged on the west coast in December and swept across the nation.

Barely 2 years old, Talia Pisano is getting tough treatment for kidney cancer that spread to her brain. She's also getting a chance at having babies of her own someday.

To battle infertility sometimes caused by cancer treatment, some children's hospitals are trying a futuristic approach: removing and freezing immature ovary and testes tissue, with hopes of being able to put it back when patients reach adulthood and want to start families.

The furor on Capitol Hill over Planned Parenthood has stoked a debate about the use of tissue from aborted fetuses in medical research, but U.S. scientists have been using such cells for decades to develop vaccines and seek treatments for a host of ailments, from vision loss and neurological disorders to cancer and AIDS.

Anti-abortion activists set off the uproar by releasing undercover videos of Planned Parenthood officials that raised questions of whether the organization was profiting from the sale of fetal tissue. Planned Parenthood has denied making any profit and said it charges fees solely to cover its costs.

People who eat lots of fried food and sugary drinks have a 56 percent higher risk of heart disease compared to those who eat healthier, U.S. researchers said Monday.

The findings in Circulation, a journal of the American Heart Association, were based on a six-year study of more than 17,000 people in the United States.

At just 26, Fatou's skin is marbled from layer on layer of whitening cream. Some even call her a "salamander" woman after the little reptile with light spots and translucent skin.

But nothing can stop the hairdresser in Ivory Coast's commercial capital Abidjan from using the skin-lightening cream in her quest for a paler complexion. 

Singapore's founding leader Lee Kuan Yew, shattered by the death of his wife, asked his doctors about the possibility of euthanasia in his final years, his daughter revealed Monday.

Lee Wei Ling, herself a doctor, wrote in a column for the Straits Times newspaper a day after Singapore celebrated 50 years of independence that the "last few years of Papa's life without Mama were a sad and difficult time".