Bacteria and fungi infection in amniotic fluid may cause a significant number of premature births in infants, new study has found.

Using new technology, Stanford researchers in California reported on Monday that they looked at fluid samples from 166 women in preterm labor; 113 of the women went on to deliver premature babies. The women were patients at Hutzel Women's Hospital in Detroit between October 1998 and December 2002

Inhaling the smoke produced from burning of incense over a long period of time could put people at risk of cancer of the respiratory tract, if they don't smoke cigarettes, researchers reported Monday.

Long-term exposure to incense fumes was associated with an increased risk for developing mouth, tongue, and certain lung cancers, as well as squamous cell lung cancer, the most common type of lung cancer in smokers

Babies born by Caesarean section have a greater risk of developing type-1 diabetes than those who are born via normal deliveries, UK research suggests.

Researchers from Queen's University Belfast examined data from 20 published studies on children with type-1 diabetes who were born by caesarean. The results found that that babies born by caesarean had a 20 per cent higher risk of diabetes compared with babies born by natural birth. The normal risk of a baby developing type 1 diabetes is three in 1,000

Breastfeeding for at least six months may help reduce a woman's risk of an aggressive form of breast cancer, new study has found.

That finding, which comes from a new study published in Monday's advance online edition of Cancer, is based on two breast cancer studies that together included nearly 2,500 women aged 55-79 in Washington state. The group included 1,140 women who had had breast cancer

Women who undergo severe stress during pregnancy risk giving birth to children who develop schizophrenia, a complex brain disorder, a study suggests.

Study leader Dr. Dolores Malaspina, from the New York University School of Medicine, and colleagues looked at birth data for 88,829 people born in Jerusalem from 1964 to 1976 and cross-referenced the information with Israel's national psychiatry registry