Three Australians have died after consuming cantaloupes amid a listeria outbreak that has made at least 11 other people across the country sick in the past seven weeks.

Listeria bacteria, although harmless to most people, pose a severe threat to the elderly, pregnant women and those with serious conditions such as diabetes and cancer.

Most of the cases have been in the state of New South Wales, with others in Queensland and Victoria.

Mr Adetodun Ajiboye, a clinical Psychologist, has stressed the need for continuous, proper sex education in homes, schools and places of worship to curtail the increasing rate of sexual abuse of children.

Ajiboye, who works with Ekiti State University Teaching Hospital, Ado-Ekiti, made the call in a telephone interview with our correspondent.

According to him, child sexual abuse is a form of molestation where an adult or older adolescent uses a child for sexual stimulation.

Ajiboye said that sex education must not be relegated to the background or seen as a taboo but must be taught to children as early as possible, to prevent sexual abuse.

Ever since the inception of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) outbreak, over 70 million people have contracted the deadly disease, while about 35 million people have died.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) 36.7 million persons are living with HIV globally.

While the burden of the epidemic continues to vary considerably between countries and regions, an estimated 0.8% of adults aged 15–49 years worldwide are living with HIV.

Researchers from France and Brazil in a new study, have established a link between “ultra-processed” foods including cookies, fizzy drinks, sugary cereals and cancer.

The researchers utilized data from nearly 105,000 French adults who completed online questionnaires detailing their intake of 3,300 different food items.

This was compared to cases of diagnosed cancer among the group.

Scientists at the University of Colorado Boulder conducted a review of existing imaging data that looked at the effects of alcohol and marijuana, or cannabis, on the brain. Their findings linked alcohol consumption with long-term changes to the structure of white matter and gray matter in the brain.