The new research results from developing and transition countries, where data on this subject was previously either unavailable or scarce*, shows that more than half of the health sector personnel surveyed had experienced at least one incident of physical or psychological violence in the year previous to the study. In South Africa that figure reached 61%, and in Thailand 54 %. Research was also conducted in Portugal where the sixty percent of the 212 respondents from a large Urban Health Centre indicated that they had been subject to at least one incident of violence in the last 12 months.