African twig brushes offer all-day dental care

By Pascal Fletcher
DAKAR, June 18 (Reuters) - Brush your teeth every day, dentists say. In Africa, that can mean keeping your toothbrush in your mouth all day long.
Across the continent south of the Sahara, many people go about their daily business with a small stick or twig protruding from their mouth, which they chew or use to scrub their teeth.Cut from wild trees and shrubs in the bush, this is the African toothbrush. Its users swear it is much more natural, effective -- and cheaper -- than the prettily packaged but pricey dental products on sale in pharmacies and supermarkets."It cleans your teeth more than plastic brushes, with the liquid that comes out of the wood," said Marcelino Diatta, a stick twitching from his mouth as he sought handouts from foreigners in downtown Dakar.
In Senegal, the chewing stick is called "sothiou", which means "to clean" in the local Wolof language. In east Africa, the stick is called "mswaki", the Swahili word for toothbrush.Their users say the sticks are also medicinal, providing not just dental hygiene but also curing a variety of other ills. Dental experts agree they seem to clean teeth well and some up-market health stores in the United States have been selling chew-sticks as a natural form of dental care.
"It's good for your stomach and your head ... it whitens your teeth and gets rid of bad breath," said Abedis Sauda, a Senegalese street vendor.
Traders in Dakar and other Senegalese cities sell neat bundles of the pencil-sized sticks -- usually about 6 inches long -- on the pavement, offering a variety of different types of wood at different prices..............