HealthDay - MONDAY, Jan. 5 (HealthDay News) -- Deanna Babcock's heart stopped beating on July 20, 2007. Just like that.

AP - A smoking ban in one Colorado city led to a dramatic drop in heart attack hospitalizations within three years, a sign of just how serious a health threat secondhand smoke is, government researchers said Wednesday.

Reuters - Lung cancer cells produce a compound that helps the tumor spread to other parts of the body, a finding that could lead to a new way to prevent this dangerous development, researchers reported on Wednesday.

Reuters - Teenagers who underestimate the risks of smoking -- or overestimate the social value -- are substantially more likely than their peers to take up the habit, a new study suggests.

HealthDay - TUESDAY, Dec. 30 (HealthDay News) -- A mutation in a gene previously found to help protect the lungs against toxins may also be linked to lung cancer and some inherited cases of a lethal lung disease affecting older adults, a new study says.

Reuters - In the large Women's Antioxidant Cardiovascular Study, participants who took beta carotene, vitamin C, vitamin E, or a combination of supplements had no significant reductions in their risk of cancer.

Reuters - Many genes linked to various cancers do not appear to raise the risk of getting cancer after all, according to an analysis of hundreds of studies published on Tuesday.

Reuters - Beta carotene, vitamin C and vitamin E supplements taken for years failed to lower overall cancer risk in the latest study to cast doubt on the possibility that such dietary supplements can prevent cancer.

HealthDay - MONDAY, Dec. 29 (HealthDay News) -- A diet rich in the inorganic phosphates found in many natural and processed foods accelerated the growth of lung cancers in rats, South Korean researchers report.

Reuters - Common food additives known as phosphates may help lung cancer tumors grow faster, at least in mice, South Korean researchers reported on Monday.

HealthDay - SATURDAY, Dec. 27 (HealthDay News) -- It's the leading cause of cancer death in the United States, killing more people each year than breast, prostate, colon, liver, kidney and melanoma cancers combined.

Reuters - Offering yet another reason to never start smoking, a new study finds that both current and former smokers run an elevated risk of the heart rhythm disorder atrial fibrillation.

Reuters - An experimental drug protected mice exposed to tobacco smoke from developing chronic lung disease, raising hope for a treatment in humans, U.S. researchers said on Monday.

HealthDay - TUESDAY, Dec. 23 (HealthDay News) -- The war against cancer gathered steam in 2008, as new drugs tackled the toughest cancers with some success, and advances were made in both disease prevention and risk factor identification.

HealthDay - MONDAY, Dec. 22 (HealthDay News) -- People may face an increased risk of lung cancer if they have a gene variant that metabolizes the most potent of cigarette smoke carcinogens, a new study says.

Reuters - Researchers in China and the United States have identified mutations of two genes which appear to make ethnic Chinese more susceptible to lung cancer, they wrote in the journal Cancer.

Reuters - Lung cancer has overtaken breast cancer as the biggest killer of Australian women with cancer, as females who started smoking in the 1970s and 1980s as they gained equal rights with men are diagnosed with the deadly disease.

Reuters - Leukemia cells use powerful chemical signals to lure healthy blood-forming stem cells into their cancerous lairs, where they lose their power to make healthy blood cells, U.S. researchers said on Thursday.

HealthDay - WEDNESDAY, Dec. 17 (HealthDay News) -- Women with ovarian cancer who had low levels of either of two enzymes associated with their tumors tended to die much sooner than women who had higher levels of one of the two enzymes, new research shows.

AFP - A colonoscopy, the procedure in which a doctor looks for dangerous growths in the large intestine, may not be as great a protection from death from colorectal cancer as once thought, a study found Tuesday.