An in-depth Study on the impacts of Operation Murambatsvina most obvious effects are physical, seen in illnesses and injuries, which may be short-lived, but also may lead to long-term disability. However, the most persistent consequences will be psychological, and especially if the trauma was deliberately inflictedxx. Here we wish to merely emphasize three points. Firstly, the most probable long-term consequence of experiencing organized violence and torture is the development of a psychological disorder. Secondly, the probability of psychological disorder following organized violence and torture increases with the frequency of experiencing physical harm, such as torture. Thirdly, the probability of psychological disorder increases with the number of exposures to trauma such as organized violence and torture. Given this understanding, we thus were interested to understand more clearly the statements of the victims of Operation Murambatsvina alleging that they were suffering from trauma. We also examined very briefly the literature relating to organized violence and torture in Zimbabwe. 2.1.2 Trauma in Zimbabwe Operation Murambatsvina is not the first complex emergency to be seen in Zimbabwe, and, over the past three decades, Zimbabwe has suffered from national disasters, such as drought or floods, as well as a number of very serious episodes of organized violence and torture. The relevance of referring to the past disasters and conflicts is that each of these episodes has generated a number of victims of trauma, some of whom will have suffered brief reactions to the trauma, whilst others, in the absence of specialized assistance, may have gone on to develop persistent trauma disorders. For example, it has been shown that there are still many victims of the Liberation War who continue to suffer from psychological and physical disability many decades after the original traumaxxi. Whilst there are very few good epidemiological studies of the incidence or prevalence of disorders due to trauma in Zimbabwe, there are a number of studies that are helpful in understanding the likely picture. These studies suggest that there are a number of periods in which mass trauma has occurred: • • • • • The Liberation War of the 1970s; The so-called “Gukurahundi” period of the 1980s; The “Food Riots” of 1998; The violence since 2000, mainly associated, but not exclusively, with elections in 2000, 2002, and 2005; Operation Murambatsvina. The morbidity due to the Liberation War has been the best documented to date, and the most reliable study indicated a likely prevalence of trauma sufferers of approximately 1 adult in 10 over the age of 30 years in 1997xxii. There has been no specialized medical or psychological assistance for these victims, although war veterans have been beneficiaries of a number of occasions of compensation. 6