The Cambodian government has ordered a hospital to stop advertising so-called virginity restoration procedures, saying it harms the "morality" of society.

A number of Cambodian clinics quietly offer hymenoplasty -- a procedure commonly sought after in countries where a woman's virginity is prized -- but Phnom Penh's Victoria International Hospital is unusual in publicly advertising their services.

The African Union plans to launch an Ebola Solidarity Fund, officials said Wednesday, as aid agency Oxfam warned the continent's leaders needed to keep their promises to boost healthcare.

Oxfam called for a "massive post-Ebola Marshall Plan", referring to the United States aid package to rebuild Europe after World War Two.

Doping in sport is a public health issue, the head of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) said Wednesday, because of the spread of substance abuse from elite athletes to school gyms.

"Too many people are taking too many substances they don't even know," WADA director general David Howman told Agence France Presse in an interview in Tokyo.

Lebanon's agriculture ministry took the necessary precautionary measures against the highly pathogenic bird flu virus H5N1 that hit an Israeli poultry farm 37 km from Lebanon's southern border.

Agriculture Minister Akram Shehayyeb told LBCI in an interview on Wednesday that “it is crucial to drive the people's attention to report to the ministry or related authorities any danger they sense in their poultry farms or elsewhere.”

World Bank President Jim Yong Kim warned Tuesday that the world remains "dangerously unprepared" for deadly pandemics like the Ebola outbreak that has killed thousands in West Africa.

"The Ebola outbreak has been devastating in terms of lives lost and the loss of economic growth in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone," Kim said in a speech at Georgetown University in Washington.

Have doctors, therapy and pills had their day in helping to wean people off addiction? 

Shopping vouchers and online social networks may be powerful, modern tools to help people quit smoking and lose weight, two unusual experiments suggested Wednesday.

Girls who consume lots of sugary drinks start menstruating at a younger age, a study said Wednesday.

The findings are important because early onset of menstruation is linked to a higher risk of breast cancer in later life, the paper said, although other experts saw flaws in the probe.

Billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates says the world must use the lessons from battling Ebola to prepare for any future "war" against a global killer disease, with the help of new technology.

Gates, in Berlin for a donor conference of the GAVI alliance bringing vaccines to poor countries, said the risk of a worldwide pandemic meant it was reckless not to act now.  

President Barack Obama will request a doubling of funds for fighting and preventing antibiotic-resistant bacteria in his 2016 budget, the White House said Tuesday.

The budget blueprint to be unveiled in February will request $1.2 billion, twice the amount granted by Congress in 2015.

Liberia's president on Monday announced the closure of an Ebola treatment facility which lay at the epicentre of the virus's worst outbreak in history, as the disease's spread has slowed in the country.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf warned Liberians that while they could not yet afford to relax, the country had made significant progress in the fight against Ebola, and thanked states who helped Monrovia combat the virus.