No family was spared by the violence. Over 90 percent of children and youths had witnessed violence and believed they would die; only slightly fewer had experienced a death in their family. A study published in a psychiatric journal estimated that one-fourth of all Rwandans suffered from posttraumatic stress syndrome.1 They called these people ihahamuka, “without lungs” or “breathless with fear.” They would walk through town, catatonic, jumping when a bus honked or someone came up behind them unannounced. Many families adopted orphans of the genocide or took in distraught relatives. Paul
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