Washington, April 29 : A research team, including an Indian-origin boffin, has developed a painless new method for detecting diabetes, utilizing saliva.

While searching for biomarkers that may indicate diabetes, doctors examined the saliva of 40 different patients.

Through salivary analysis, they managed to devise a new `non-invasive' method for detecting diabetes that foregoes the uncomfortable prick of a needle- patients need only to spit into a cup.

The spit test could be performed for little cost in a doctor's office or at a patient's home.

Johannesburg - Airport authorities in South Africa on Wednesday said the swine flu outbreak had provided impetus to plans for the installation of technology that can help detect the virus among travellers, according to press and radio reports. Bongani Maseko, operations director of the Airports Company of South Africa (ACSA), which manages the country's airports, was quoted gave details of the plans to thermal image detection systems in light of the outbreak.

"They would certainly help ... to detect people who may be carrying the disease," he told the South African Broadcasting Corporation.

London, Apr 29 : A daily dose of aspirin in your 40s could cut the risk of developing cancer later in life, a new study claims.

A study published in the Lancet Oncology suggests taking aspirin at any age before cancer begins to develop - and for at least ten years - would maximise the drug''s potential to prevent the fatal disease.

Researchers believe the drug blocks the effects of the COX enzymes - proteins involved in inflammation and found at unusually high levels in several types of cancer, reports The Daily Express.

Washington, Apr 29 : Smokers interested in quitting the habit can now get some serious help from their iPhones - a new free application of the smart phone provides a live quitline coach and uses live text to advice on how to kick the butt.

Developed by The George Washington University's School of Public Health and Health Services (SPHHS) and the National Tobacco Cessation Collaborative (NTCC), "My QuitLine" app also provides evidence-based treatment for quitting.

Bangkok  - Lab tests conducted on a 42-year-old Thai woman who was quarantined after showing swine-flu-like symptoms have shown her free of the virus, hospital officials said Wednesday.

The woman, who had attended a seminar in Mexico from April 3 to 11, was admitted to hospital and put under quarantine Tuesday with a light fever, was found to be suffering from ordinary human flu, Chulalongkorn Hospital virus expert Dr Yong Phoosuwan told a press conference.

Like other Asian countries, Thailand has been swift to respond to the swine flu scare.

Mexico City - Mexican authorities corrected the number of people killed by swine flu from previously 20 to seven.

Miguel Angel Lezana, director of the national epidemiological and disease control centre, said late Tuesday the mutated H1N1 swine flu virus was confirmed to be responsible for seven deaths. The other 13 cases could not be confirmed yet.

Mexican authorities previously put the swine flu death toll at 20. Lezana said additional testing was conducted on recommendation of the the Geneva-based World Health Organization.