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An International Network of field sites with continuous Demographic |
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Bandim Health Project, GAMBIA (BANDIM DSS)
The Bandim DSS is located in a suburban area of the capital Bissau in Guinea-Bissau, West Africa, a former Portuguese colony, which was liberated in 1974, after a violent war. The study area comprises six suburbs of the capital and a mobile rural unit following a national cohort of women of fertile age and their children from 100 villages. The DSS has a population of more than 100 000, which is partly suburban and partly rural. After independence in 1974 an extremely high under-five mortality rate (around 500/1000 person-years observed) prompted the Ministry of Health to approach the Swedish Agency for Research Cooperation with Developing Countries to organize a study to define nutritional priorities in preventive health care. The nutrition and child-health study was initiated in 1978, and a census was carried out, with a subsequent anthropometric survey and organization of antenatal care for all women found pregnant during the census. All new pregnancies were registered, together with births, deaths, and migrations. This became the basis for the ongoing registration of the population in the Bandim suburb.
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Priority Research Areas
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