Scientists in Germany and Africa on Wednesday said they had found two variants of genes that help to explain why some lucky individuals do not develop severe malaria.

The two variants were netted in a comparison of 1,325 people in the West African state of Ghana who had fallen ill with severe falciparum malaria and of 828 counterparts who were otherwise healthy.

The southwestern U.S. state of Texas is battling an outbreak of the West Nile virus, with 17 deaths blamed on the mosquito-borne disease, authorities said Wednesday.

Throughout the state 465 people have been sickened since the start of the year, putting it on track to have the most cases since the disease first emerged a decade ago, the Texas Department of State Health Services said.

Australia said Thursday it has no plans to ban smoking after a key court ruling allowing cigarettes to be sold in plain packets, describing the health battle against tobacco as "one step at a time."

Tobacco products will have to be sold in drab, uniform packaging with graphic health warnings in Australia from December 1 after global cigarette firms lost a constitutional challenge against the world-first plan.

Suicide rates can rise by between eight and 15 percent in times of economic hardship, according to studies that separately probed the effects of Europe's economic crisis and of droughts in Australia.

Writing in the BMJ medical journal, researchers estimated the recession may have been to blame for some 1,000 people taking their own lives in Britain between 2008 and 2010.

Some 23,000 cheap Chinese-made cars were Wednesday recalled in Australia after asbestos was found in their engines, with unions demanding to know how they came to be in the country.

Importer Ateco Automotive instructed all Chery and Great Wall dealers to stop selling affected vehicles, with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) closely watching developments.

Global tobacco firms lost a "watershed" court challenge to Australia's plain packaging laws for cigarettes on Wednesday in a closely-watched case health advocates said will have a worldwide impact.

The High Court of Australia ruled the measures, forcing cigarettes and tobacco products to be sold in drab, uniform packaging with graphic health warnings from December 1 this year, did not breach the country's constitution.

Addiction to morphine and heroin can be blocked, according to research released Wednesday which could prove a major breakthrough in treating addicts and in pain relief treatments.

Researchers at the University of Adelaide in Australia worked with colleagues at the University of Colorado in the United States to pinpoint a key mechanism in the body's immune system that amplifies addiction to opioid drugs.

Guatemalans who had been subjected to sexually transmitted diseases by U.S. researchers in the 1940s have appealed a judge's dismissal of their lawsuit.

U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton dismissed the suit two months ago. He ruled that federal law bars claims against the U.S. based on injuries suffered abroad. The victims filed an appeal Monday with the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington.

Drugmakers AstraZeneca PLC and Pfizer Inc. have reached a deal giving Pfizer future rights to sell a nonprescription version of AstraZeneca's blockbuster heartburn drug, Nexium, as early as 2014.

The deal, announced late Monday, could help Pfizer expand its consumer-health business as it continues a restructuring meant to strengthen its core drug business and divest its infant-formula and animal-health businesses. The companies said they're exploring the idea of a partnership to convert other AstraZeneca prescription drugs to over-the-counter medicines.

Swiss pharma giant Roche said Monday it will sell in the United States a drug that treats a diabetes-related illness linked to blindness after getting the regulatory green light.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) decision means that Roche can take Lucentis to the U.S. to treat diabetic macular oedema (DME), a condition that causes swelling, blurred vision and blindness in people with diabetes.