Women of reproductive age should get an advance prescription for emergency contraception to keep in case they ever need it, the nation's largest gynecologist group advised Monday.

The posters are part of a campaign urging doctors to explain the morning-after pill to every woman of reproductive age they examine and offer a prescription to those eligible. The campaign aims to increase access to emergency birth control after the Bush administration's refusal to allow it to be sold without a prescription nationwide.

The morning-after pill is a high dose of regular birth control pills. It cuts the chances of pregnancy by up to 89 percent if used within 72 hours of rape, condom failure or simply forgetting routine contraception.

White blood cells from mice that are naturally immune to cancer cured tumors in other mice when injected and provided them with lifelong immunity to the disease, researchers reported Monday.

The finding indicates a biological pathway previously unsuspected in any species, and researchers are working to understand the genetic and immunological basis of the surprising phenomenon.

Preliminary studies hint at the existence of a similar resistance in humans, and researchers hope that harnessing the biological process could lead to a new approach to treating cancer.

Women who take estrogen-only pills for at least 15 years run a markedly higher risk of developing breast cancer, according to a study of nearly 29,000 nurses. But no increased danger was found among those who took the hormone for less than 10 years.

Researchers said the findings should be reassuring for women who want to use estrogen for a short time to relieve menopausal symptoms such as hot flashes and vaginal dryness.

The study, overseen by Harvard-affiliated researchers, found that for women who had been on estrogen for at least 15 years, the risk of hormonally driven breast cancer (the most common type in the United States) climbed 48 percent. At the 20-year mark, the risk of any type of breast cancer rose 42 percent.

Testing for the AIDS virus could become part of routine physical exams for adults and teens if doctors follow new U.S. guidelines expected to be issued by this summer.

The guidelines for voluntary testing would apply to every American ages 13 to 64, according to the proposal from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

That's in line with an earlier study that indicated gay men's brain responses were different from straight men — though the difference for men was more pronounced than has now been found in women.

Lesbians' brains reacted somewhat, though not completely, like those of heterosexual men, a team of Swedish researchers said in today's edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Worldwide, about 4 million babies die in their first month of life — about half of those in the first 24 hours, a global report on infant mortality says.

Simple measures like knit caps to keep babies warm could help save many of those lives, according to the report released Monday by the U.S.-based group Save the Children.

Senate Democrats on Monday blocked Republican medical malpractice legislation during the GOP's opening session of a "health week" of proposals designed to win support from conservative voters — if not passage.

The dispatch of a pair of bills to cap the amount of damages juries can award in medical malpractice cases has been expected since last week. Republicans forced the votes to demonstrate the GOP's commitment to fighting what Majority Leader Bill Frist called a "litigation lottery."

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