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In studying language policy, it is not enough to look at central government management, but also at the influence of managers at levels ranging from the family to international organizations. Actual cases reveal that there are also non-linguistic forces such as demography, war, civil strife, and economic breakdowns which have major effects. This paper summarizes a study of the Portuguese empire and its aftermath. The empire enforced the hegemony of Portuguese as the civilizing force that would remedy deficits in conquered peoples. Because settlers were usually males, intermarriage with local women or slaves was common. However, colonial policy and acceptance by the leaders of independence movements as a unifying language, recognizing the benefits of elite closure, meant that postcolonial successor states kept Portuguese as the language of instruction and government, and did not use indigenous languages. Civil strife, warfare, corruption, and economic breakdown after independence prevented the improvement of education in many cases. Thus, while Portuguese provided access to an international language and served as the unifying symbol for Lusophone organizations, it was at the cost of the stigmatization of indigenous languages and left a social gap between the urban elite and the rural citizens limited to local languages.

The objective of this work is to develop a simple methodology for high resolution crop suitability analysis under current and future climate, easily applicable and useful in Least Developed Countries. The approach addresses both regional planning in the context of climate change projections and pre-emptive short-term rural extension interventions based on same-year agricultural season forecasts, while implemented with off-the-shelf resources. The developed tools are applied operationally in a case-study developed in three regions of Guinea-Bissau and the obtained results, as well as the advantages and limitations of methods applied, are discussed. In this paper we show how a simple approach can easily generate information on climate vulnerability and how it can be operationally used in rural extension services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Portugal, for long a country of emigration, has in recent decades become one of immigration. One of the largest groups of newcomers is constituted by Africans from the former Portuguese colonies. This paper focuses on how religion and ritual traditions from their home country are manipulated by people from Guinea-Bissau in order to recreate their identity in the urban world of Lisbon. Based on fieldwork conducted among the Pepel of Guinea-Bissau from 1997 to the present and on ongoing research on a Pepel religious healer in Lisbon, this paper specifically dwells on the issue of transnational spirits. It explores how such entities are constructed, and the rituals around them. This entails a complex and ceaseless relation between the world of the living and the world of the dead, as well as a constant flow of goods and symbols between the physical original grounds, in Guinea-Bissau, and Lisbon: people, money, goods, practices and ideas, as well as spirits, circulate and create bridges between Europe and Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: In attempting to understand how the use of medicinal plants is symbolically valued and transformed according to specific cosmologies, we gain valuable insight into the ethnopharmacologial practices, in terms of the major role played by healers, as custodians of local ethnobotanical knowledge, but also as ritual masters. Thus, the goal of this paper is to understand how medicinal plants are used differently depending on a combination between the healers' field of expertise and personal history on the one hand, and the diversified religious and symbolical frameworks on the other. Methods: This essay is based on intense ethnographical research carried out amongst the Nalu people of Guinea-Bissau. Methods included participant observation and semi-directed interviews with six locally-renown healers (four men and two women). The progress of their work and the changes operated within the sets of beliefs associated with ethnopharmacological practices were registered by means of repeated field visits. Results: A total of 98 species and 147 uses are accounted for, as well as a description of the plant parts that were used, as well as the methods of preparation and application according to the different healers' specialized practices. At the same time, this research describes those processes based on pre-Islamic and Muslim cosmologies through which medicinal plants are accorded their value, and treatments are granted their symbolic efficiency. Conclusions: Medicinal plants are valued differently in the pre-Islamic medicine and in the medicine practiced by Islamic masters. The increasing relevance of Islam within this context has affected the symbolic framework of ethnopharmacological practices. Nevertheless, the endurance of those processes by which symbolic efficiency is attributed to local treatments based on plants is explained not only by the syncretic nature of African Islam, but also by the fact that patients adopt different therapeutic pathways simultaneously. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While humans require water for life, one-sixth of our species lives without access to safe water. In Africa, the situation is particularly acute because of global warming, the progression of the Sahara desert, civil unrest and poor governance, population growth, migration and poverty. In rural areas, the lack of adequate safe water and sanitary infrastructures leaves millions with doubtful water quality, increasing the harshness of daily life. In this paper, a pilot study was conducted during the wet season on Bolama Island (Guinea-Bissau, West Africa), a UNESCO Man and the Biosphere Reserve. Twenty-eight shallow wells, supplying water to most of the population, were sampled for microbiological, physical and chemical water quality characteristics. A ten-parameter water quality index (WQI) adapted to tropical conditions was applied to compare the different wells. About 79% of the wells showed moderate to heavy fecal contamination. From the surveyed parameters, it was found that chemical contamination was less important, although all samples were acidic, with the pH averaging 5.12±0.08. The WQI was 43±4% (0%—worst; 100%—best quality), showing that the water from the majority of wells was polluted but should be suitable for domestic use after appropriate treatment. At the onset of the wet season, diarrhea represented 11.5% of all medical cases, 92.5% of which were children aged <15. This paper suggests inexpensive steps to reduce the fecal contamination and control the pH in order to increase the potability of the well water and, concomitantly, to raise the living standards of the population in one of the poorest countries of the world. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The burden of diabetes mellitus in Sub-Saharan Africa is growing rapidly, and yet the prevalence and patient characteristics are still largely unknown. We analyzed clinical and demographic characteristics of Type 2 diabetes (T2DM) patients attending a diabetes clinic in Guinea-Bissau from February 2008 to April 2014, and estimated the prevalence and risk factors of unknown-impaired fasting plasma glucose (FPG) and diabetes, as well as excess mortality associated with T2DM. We characterized T2DM patients attending the national diabetes clinic in Bissau. Diabetes was diagnosed based on FPG. We matched T2DM patients 1:1 with non-diabetes community controls on age and sex to determine relevant risk factors for T2DM using logistic regression. Furthermore, we matched patients 1:6 with community controls to assess long-term survival (until February 2019) in a Cox regression using calendar time as the underlying timescale. Verbal autopsies determined the cause of death among T2DM patients and controls. The mean age among T2DM was 50.6 (SD 11.1), and the mean FPG at first consultation was high (13.2 mmol/L (SD 5.1)). Ethnicity, family history of diabetes, hypertension, and anthropometrics differed among T2DM patients, community controls with impaired FPG, and healthy controls. Family history of diabetes (OR = 5.65, 95% CI: 3.10–10.3) and elevated waist circumference (2.33, 1.26–4.29) were significant risk factors for T2DM. 20.4% (59/289) of community controls had abnormal FPG. T2DM patients had an excess mortality hazard ratio of 3.53 (95%CI: 1.92–6.52). Deaths caused by bacterial infections, including foot ulcers, were more common among T2DM patients, compared with community controls (54% (7/13) vs. 19% (5/27) (P = 0.02)). Several risk factors including were associated with T2DM in Guinea-Bissau. We found a high prevalence of elevated FPG among randomly selected community controls. In combination with higher mortality among T2DM patients, an urgent need for better treatment options and increased awareness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite a common trajectory, sport has taken significantly different forms in Cape Verde and Portuguese Guinea. These differences provide a glimpse into both the plasticity of sport as a phenomenon and the specificities of colonial processes, even more remarkable in this case, given that both contexts involve the same colonizer: Portugal. This study focuses on the different ways in which representations of sport were constructed in Cape Verde and in Portuguese Guinea during the colonial period. The debate centres on two themes: (a) the political uses of sport by metropolitan interests and (b) the political uses of sport by local interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Though still high, the infant mortality rate in Guinea-Bissau has declined. We aimed to identify risk factors including vaccination coverage, for infant mortality in the rural population of Guinea-Bissau and assess whether these risk factors changed from 1992–3 to 2002–3. Methods: The Bandim Health Project (BHP) continuously surveys children in rural Guinea-Bissau. We investigated the association between maternal and infant factors (especially DTP and measles coverage) and infant mortality. Hazard ratios (HR) were calculated using Cox regression. We tested for interactions with sex, age groups (defined by current vaccination schedule) and cohort to assess whether the risk factors were the same for boys and girls, in different age groups in 1992–3 and in 2002–3. Results: The infant mortality rate declined from 148/1000 person years (PYRS) in 1992–3 to 124/1000 PYRS in 2002–3 (HR = 0.88;95%CI:0.77–0.99); this decline was significant for girls (0.77;0.64–0.94) but not for boys (0.97;0.82–1.15) (p = 0.10 for interaction). Risk factors did not differ significantly by cohort in either distribution or effect. Mortality decline was most marked among girls aged 9–11 months (0.56;0.37–0.83). There was no significant mortality decline for girls 1.5–8 months of age (0.93;0.68–1.28) (p = 0.05 for interaction). DTP and measles coverage increased from 1992–3 to 2002–3. Conclusions: Risk factors did not change with the decline in mortality. Due to beneficial non-specific effects for girls, the increased coverage of measles vaccination may have contributed to the disproportional decline in mortality by sex and age group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Artemether-lumefantrine (AL) was introduced for treatment of uncomplicated malaria in Guinea-Bissau in 2008. Malaria then resurged and recurrent malaria after treatment with AL and stock-outs of AL were common. This study therefore aimed to assess the efficacy of AL and identify an alternative second line antimalarial. Dihydroartemisinin-piperaquine (DP) was chosen as it has been shown to be safe and efficacious and to reduce the incidence of recurrent malaria. Methods and Findings: In a multicentre randomised open-label non-inferiority clinical trial, AL or DP were given over 3 days to children aged 6 months-15 years with uncomplicated P. falciparum mono-infection. Intake was observed and AL was given with milk. Children were seen on days 0, 1, 2 and 3 and then weekly days 7–42. Recurring P. falciparum were classified as recrudescence or new infections by genotyping. Between November 2012 and July 2015, 312 children were randomised to AL (n = 155) or DP (n = 157). The day 42 PCR adjusted per protocol adequate clinical and parasitological responses were 95% and 100% in the AL and DP groups respectively, Mantel-Haenszel weighted odds ratio (OR) 0.22 (95% CI 0–0.68), p = 0.022. In a modified intention to treat analysis in which treatment failures day 0 and reinfections were also considered as treatment failures adequate clinical and parasitological responses were 94% and 97% (OR 0.42 [95% CI, 0.13–1.38], p = 0.15). Parasite clearance and symptom resolution were similar with both treatments. Conclusions: Both treatments achieved the WHO recommended efficacy for antimalarials about to be adopted as policy. DP was not inferior to AL for treatment of uncomplicated P. falciparum malaria in Guinea-Bissau. Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For almost ten years, the West African country of Guinea-Bissau has been subject to security sector reform as part of international peacebuilding interventions. As in other peacebuilding and peacekeeping interventions elsewhere, ‘Global North’-borne perceptions, interpretations, images, and normative structures (‘peacebuilding mindsets’) have dominated the reform. They have been discursively reproduced in Guinea-Bissau's ‘peacebuilding economy’, encompassing spaces such as specific restaurants, hotels, recreation sites etc. Such ‘neutral’ venues or ‘uncommitted spaces’ have facilitated informal exchanges between discordant international organizations and actors, but contributed to the exclusion of local actors and voices. The article argues that the peacebuilding economy contributes both to the reproduction of ‘Global North’ patterns of perception and interpretation, and to the failure of peacebuilding initiatives. This is unsurprising considering that both locals and internationals engaged in the peacebuilding arena may benefit from job and rent opportunities in supposedly better designed follow-up projects. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

During the last decades, agricultural land-uses in West Africa were marked by dramatic shifts in the coverage of individual crops. Nowadays, cashew (Anacardium occidentale L.) is one of the most export-oriented horticulture crops, notably in Guinea-Bissau. Relying heavily on agriculture to increase their income, developing countries have been following a strong trend of moving on from traditional farming systems toward commercial production. Emerging infectious diseases, driven either by adaptation to local conditions or inadvertent importation of plant pathogens, are able to cause tremendous cashew production losses, with economic and social impact of which, in developing countries is often underestimated. Presently, plant genomics with metagenomics as an emergent tool, presents an enormous potential to better characterize diseases by providing extensive knowledge on plant pathogens at a large scale. In this perspective, we address metagenomics as a promising genomic tool to identify cashew fungal associated diseases as well as to discriminate the causal pathogens, aiming at obtaining tools to help design effective strategies for disease control and thus promote the sustainable production of cashew in West African Region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Twins traditionally retain a special status in many African societies. In Guinea-Bissau, twins are often well regarded yet still suffer from a very high mortality, especially in the perinatal and infant period. At the Bandim Health Project, a health and demographic surveillance site, we have recently established one of the first twin registries in Sub-Saharan Africa. Our short-term aim is to describe twin mortality and morbidity in order to design appropriate health interventions. Our long-term goal is a large-scale database to explore the pathogenesis of prevalent diseases; for example, diabetes mellitus, metabolic syndrome, and infectious diseases such as HIV, tuberculosis, and malaria. A major focus area is also the etiology of low birth weight and how epigenetic processes might modulate the consequences of low birth weight in Sub-Saharan Africa. For this, monozygotic twin studies represent a powerful tool. Though twin studies have been carried out by the Bandim Health Project for more than 30 years, the renewed registry described here was officially established in 2009 and includes both a cohort of newborn twins and a cohort of young and adult twins. Currently more than 1,500 twins are being followed in the two cohorts combined. We believe that the registry holds exciting possibilities and will encourage the establishment of further twin registries across the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sub-Saharan Africa, although not among Europe's closest neighbours, has, over the past decade, increasingly been perceived as a source of threats to Europe's security. This article will attempt to outline European perceptions of African security and justice issues and how these perceptions have in turn influenced the EU's policies in Africa. Specific attention will be given here to Guinea-Bissau, which is a particularly interesting and illustrative case study, as this small country in West Africa has attracted considerable European engagement in such fields as illegal immigration, counter-terrorism, drug-combating and security sector reform. This European engagement through different, at times uncoordinated and overlapping, channels does not always make for a consistent approach and underlines a profound gap between what has come to be a generally accepted diagnostic - that international insecurity is caused, or at least facilitated, by weak states - and the remedies applied by the EU. While Europe increasingly perceives Africa's weak governance as a security threat, it remains unwilling to engage politically and on a longer-term basis on the continent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The determination of the prevalence of inherited hemoglobin (Hb) disorders in endemic areas is important in order to develop programs for their control and management. The aim of this study is to determine the prevalence of inherited Hb diseases in Guinea-Bissau which is situated on the west coast of Africa, between Senegal and Guinea. One thousand and fifty-seven blood samples were collected and analyzed with high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) for detection of β-thalassemia (thal) and Hb variants, and by gap polymerase chain reaction (gap-PCR) for the detection of deletions in the α-globin genes. We found 4.7% children were heterozygous for Hb S [β6(A3)Glu→Val, G A G →G T G], 0.2% were homozygous for Hb S, and 0.3% were heterozygous for Hb C [β6(A3)Glu→Lys, G A G →A AG ]. One child had heterozygous β + -thal, 13.8% were heterozygous for the -α 3.7 deletion, 1.5% were homozygous for the -α 3.7 deletion, and 1.5% were heterozygous for the -α 4.2 deletion. We recommend national screening programs to focus primarily on sickle cell disease, since β-thal is rare, and the observed α-thal deletions are of minor genetic importance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]