Australia is poised to introduce the world's harshest anti-smoking laws, with tobacco companies forced to sell cigarettes in plain packets resembling prescription drug packs.

A typical pack of 25 cigarettes will cost now $17 after tax hikes were bulldozed through Parliament last night.

Tobacco tax will jump 10 per cent from midnight, raising the price of a pack of 20 cigarettes by about a dollar to around $11.

Smoking, drinking too much, inactivity and poor diet can collectively age you by 12 years.

George Thomson and Helen Wilson ask why the Government is lagging on smokefree car laws.

Medical researchers have begun to elucidate the complex role of genes in human health.

Obese patients have been paid up to $911 to lose weight in a UK trial to test if financial incentives can be used to change unhealthy behaviour.

MPs probing the tobacco industry got personal with the family of a Maori smoking victim describing the impact of his addiction and death.

An Auckland academic says smoking rates in New Zealand would plummet if tobacco products could not be displayed at shops.

Maori told the parliamentary tobacco inquiry today that their marae were being undermined by tobacco smoking and associated early death.

Canadian women's ice hockey team celebrate their gold medal win over the USA with beer, champagne and cigars on the ice.

Cigarette smokers have lower IQs than non-smokers and the more a person smokes, the lower his IQ, according to a new study.

Researchers at Columbia University found happier people were less likely to develop serious heart problems.

TVNZ staff under investigation for marijuana use tried to get photos taken during a smoking session deleted, according to people at the gathering.

A proposal to ban smoking at beaches and other public places doesn't have the support of John Key, who thinks it is too "nanny state".