For the past eight years, major cigarette makers and 46 state governments have enjoyed a beautiful partnership: The cigarette companies paid billions into state coffers in return for the states

The Environmental Protection Agency is relaxing certain emission standards for diesel cars in an effort to get more of these fuel-efficient -- but still relatively dirty -- vehicles on the road. The

A global effort to wipe out the disfiguring disease known as elephantiasis has won its first major victory by nearly eliminating the parasite that causes it in most areas of Egypt, one of the first

Federal regulators, amid concern of a possible avian-flu pandemic, moved to ban the poultry industry from using two groups of human antiviral drugs to treat their flocks, for fear that may reduce

The World Health Organization is discussing whether to expand access to its private bird-flu database, as pressure mounts on the United Nations agency to do so as a way to spur wider research on the

The World Trade Organization ruled that Mexico violated global trade rules in a soft-drink dispute with the U.S. A WTO panel rejected a Mexican appeal, supporting U.S. claims that Mexico was in

The United Nations' food-aid arm approved a $102 million two-year program aimed at feeding small children and pregnant women in North Korea despite restrictions imposed by Pyongyang, which last year

China's efforts to maintain control over samples of avian flu taken on its soil, as well as the research done on them, have put it at odds with international health officials trying to defeat the

ABB Ltd. is likely to settle its U.S. asbestos litigation in early spring, concluding 10 years of restructuring and stanching a $1 billion stream of losses. The Swiss electrical-engineering company

European Union governments endorsed plans by France and the Netherlands to vaccinate millions of chickens, geese and ducks against bird flu as the virus swept across Europe and veterinarians