Political violence and its impact on female civil population

The main aim of this work was to find out the status of mental and physical health of civilian women, living in conflict affected areas. Pilot studies were conducted in seven countries in order to collect demographic information and to measure the level of anxiety, depression and posttraumatic stress disorder. The women showed a very high exposure to different traumatic events. The worst reported event was military combat or war zone, followed by life-threatening illness, serious accident, fire or explosion, torture and imprisonment. 81% of women showed PTSD symptoms, from them 16,7% had current PTSD symptoms and 83,3% PTSD lasting more than one year. 18% of women also suffering from moderate to severe levels of depression and 18% from a severe level of depression. Levels of anxiety were also very high and have reached recommended cut-off point for mean 1.75 for HSCL-10 and HSCL-15 in 5 out of 7 countries and 2.25 for HSCL-25. With such extreme numbers of depression symptoms, anxiety and PTSD, our findings correlate with findings from areas such as Afghanistan, Bosnia, Sierra Leone, which are known for its brutality.