New York City's health department wants to require some restaurants to include the the number of calories their foods contain on their menus. Fast-food chains, however, are not in favor of the proposal.

The requirement would apply only to restaurants that serve standard portions and already disclose calorie information, typically on their Web sites or on fliers. Most fast-food chains fall into this category, and the city estimates the rule would apply to about one in every 10 restaurants

The Indian State of Rajasthan have imposed a ban against 7,000 farmers from cultivating poppies used for the legal production of opium because they were producing poppies of inferior quality.

India is the largest legitimate producer of opium in the world used by local and international pharmaceutical companies

A report from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) says free and unstructured play is healthy and necessary for children to make social, emotional, and cognitive developments to aid them in dealing with stress.

The report called, "The Importance of Play in Promoting Healthy Child Development and Maintaining Strong Parent-Child Bonds," had been written to justify playtime when changes in family structure, the competitive college admissions process, and federal education policies have resulted to less recess and physical education

Uganda's First Lady Janet Museveni on Sunday introduced the Moon Beads, a device with 32 colored beads to help women prevent unwanted pregnancies. The device allows women to know the days when they can get pregnant by counting the beads.

Musuveni told Sunday Vision, "I know that teaching or practicing family planning for a backward population is very hard. But I urge you to work selflessly

A new study suggests that a public smoking ban in Italy has resulted in a drop in heart attack cases admitted in hospitals. The study estimates that heart attack-related admissions dropped by 11 percent within the first five months after the law was enacted when compared to the other years.

A BBC news report quotes Dr Francesco Barone-Adesi of the Cancer Epidemiology Unit at the University of Turin, and the lead researcher of the study as saying, "The rates of acute myocardial infarction (heart attack) had, if anything, been increasing between 2001 and 2004, so the reduction we saw in the first half of 2005 was not attributable to long-term trends