AFP Health

Bangladeshi conjoined twins Trishna and Krishna appeared on Sunday to have beaten the odds with their miracle story of survival, both awaking from landmark separation surgery happy and well. As they faced the prospect of looking at each other face-to-face for the first time, the successful separation of the two-year-olds who were born joined at the head has been hailed as a medical triumph. Their guardian Moira Kelly, who has cared for the girls since their arrival in Australia two years ago, said it was hoped that the children's cots could be brought together soon so they could touch each other. "They're too weak ... Read Full Story

Pairing family planning services with HIV/AIDS treatment can help curb Africa's population growth rate which records a yearly increase of 2.5 percent, health experts said Monday. Many of those seeking HIV/AIDS information are often the ones who need to be offered birth control services, Maggwa Ndugga of Family Health International told AFP. Ndugga said the strategy would be to use the enormous global investment made to counter HIV/AIDS to provide information on family planning. "We started to realise that most of the people who were coming to us for HIV AIDS information are the same people that we needed to be targeting for family ... Read Full Story

Beaten or sexually abused children are more likely to show accelerated ageing of cells later in life, a condition linked to higher rates of cancer and heart disease, according to a study released Friday. Investigators found that the natural process by which protective "caps" on the end of chromosomes, called telomeres, are worn away as humans age was accelerated among adults who had suffered such trauma in childhood. Earlier studies had shown that psychological stress elevates risk for a wide range of diseases and mental conditions. And separate research had shown that telomeres shorten at a higher rate when exposed to toxins such as ... Read Full Story

More than one in 10 British people don't realise that a woman can still get pregnant if she has sex standing up, according to a poll Friday. Nearly one in five -- 19 percent -- are also unaware that a woman can get pregnant during her period, or if the man withdraws before ejaculation, according to the government-commissioned survey. While 11 percent believe that sex standing up is an effective contraceptive method, more than a third -- 37 percent -- never talk about contraception with their partners at all. "In spite of our love of talking about sex and relationships, the survey suggests it's ... Read Full Story

The maternal mortality rate has decreased by 50 percent in a decade in some ex-Soviet bloc and Balkan countries, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) said in a report unveiled Thursday. The rate of women dying just before, after or during birth went down from 51 to 24 in 100,000 births between 2000 and 2009, according to the report on former 12 former Soviet bloc countries, not including Baltic states, and eight southeast European countries including Turkey. Abortion rates were reduced by more than 50 percent in 15 years from 1,049 to 493 compared to 1,000 births in the region, which still has one ... Read Full Story