Birth to Twenty (BT20) is Africa's largest and longest running study of child and adolescent health and development.
[2] The first round of the study began in 1989/1990, and questioned the still-pregnant mothers about general demographic characteristics, and the conditions of the pregnancy.
The study is unique source of information for major policy decisions in the South Africa, especially due to the absence of other data.
According to the "Memorandum of Understanding," interested researches should contact the projects Executive Committee if they wish to obtain the study's data or publish a paper based on it.
Since 1998, the Wellcome Trust has been a major contributor, with additional support coming from the Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa, the Medical Research Council, the University of the Witwatersrand, the Mellon Foundation, the South-African Netherlands Programme on Alternative Development and the Anglo American Chairman's Fund.