Summary: Despite its amorous nickname, the vinchuca, or kissing bug, actually gives its sleeping victims a malevolent bite sucking blood and transmitting a microscopic parasite called Tripanisoma cruzi. The microbe, in turn, produces Chagas disease, which currently afflicts 16 million people in South America and will kill a quarter of them in middle age. This program travels into the mountain villages...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: Among the research and funding experts of the global health community, the "Big Three" diseases are AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. As urgent as it is to fight these illnesses, many others also need attention and aren't getting it. These "forgotten diseases" include elephantiasis (or lymphatic filariasis), bilharzia (or schistosomiasis), and river blindness (or onchocerciasis), among others....
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: More and more drug-resistant strains of Haemophilus influenzae type b bacteria (Hib) have emerged in recent years, and the consequences of late or no treatment are devastating. The microbe is estimated to cause at least 3 million cases of serious disease-often meningitis-and up to 700,000 deaths each year among young children. This program examines the tragic problem in Bangladesh, where the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: Lymphatic filariasis, a mosquito-borne parasitic disease commonly known as elephantiasis, results in massive swelling of the limbs and genitals, leading to severe disability. Over 40 million people are seriously incapacitated and disfigured by it, with millions more at risk. Now an ambitious campaign is underway to eliminate the disease globally by interrupting its transmission. Two...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: When polio vaccines were first developed, many experts thought the disease would be fully eradicated within decades. Tragically, as this film shows, it has survived in places like Afghanistan and northern Nigeria. These locations are now acting as disease reservoirs, with children the hardest-hit demographic and with travelers re-infecting other countries once thought invulnerable....
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2004
View online at AVOD
Summary: Swimming, bathing, washing clothes, and fishing-these are everyday activities that put people in the developing world at risk of catching bilharzia (or schistosomiasis), if the water is infected with eggs of the schistosome worm. Left untreated, the disease can eventually block internal organs such as the liver and intestine, often leading to death. Children are especially at risk, with even a...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: A major problem in the spread of chlamydia in the developing world is that people rarely have the time to see a doctor, let alone attend a follow-up appointment. In the Philippines a journey to a clinic can take a whole day, and the diagnostic test takes five to six hours. However, the development of a much more rapid screener-a test strip utilizing nanogold technology-has taken place in...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: Lurking in stagnant pools and muddy watering holes, the guinea worm easily gets into the food chain-and, because it is frighteningly invulnerable to stomach acids and the human immune system, it is next to impossible to remove from the body. But now, scientists are on the verge of eradicating the parasite, humanity's oldest and largest nematode enemy. This program journeys to Sudan, the country...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: Kala-azar, the common name for visceral leishmaniasis, is characterized by irregular bouts of fever, substantial weight loss, swelling of the spleen and liver, and anemia. If left untreated it is almost certainly fatal. This program was filmed in the Indian state of Bihar, where 90 percent of the country's kala-azar cases are located. Forty per cent of these cases are now resistant to the drugs...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: Dengue fever is a mosquito-borne infection, which affects some 50 million people annually. It is now endemic in more than 100 countries in Africa, South America, the Eastern Mediterranean, Southeast Asia, and the Western Pacific. This program journeys to Thailand to join scientists at the forefront of the fight to contain and eliminate Dengue. Viewers learn about one of the principal challenges...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: New and lethal strains of TB are emerging worldwide which cannot be treated by conventional drugs. One estimate puts the number of new MDR TB cases per year as high as 400,000. After 40 years without any research into new drugs, the race is on to find a cure for MDR TB. This program travels between Peru and South Korea as it examines both the current impact of TB super strains in the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: Thriving in more than 50 developing countries, mostly in Africa and Asia, trachoma is the leading cause of blindness in the world. It is at its worst in rural communities and women are its favorite victims. Trachoma is a bacterium that lurks in stagnant water and, once established in a human host, creates deforming scar tissue in the eye. This program shows how the struggle against the disease...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This year alone, eight million people will become infected with tuberculosis. Like the common cold, TB spreads through the air when sufferers cough, sneeze, spit, or just talk. One needs only to inhale a few germs to catch it. This program tracks the disease, its impact, and the science behind it, from the U.K. to India to Malawi. At the Imperial College in London, Professor Douglas Young is...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: Striking in areas where vaccines tend to be out of reach, the 2005 Indian Ocean tsunami produced fears of an immediate cholera epidemic. But one district in southern India showed the world how to defy the odds, clearing contaminated debris and working with UNICEF to distribute clean water, thus keeping cholera at bay without the help of drugs. This film travels to Tamil Nadu where aid workers...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program travels to Cambodia, where 1 in 10 people carry hepatitis B, a major cause of liver cancer. Mothers often transmit the virus to their babies during childbirth, and children can pass the infection to each other through even the most minor cuts and scratches. At London's Hammersmith Hospital, pioneering new surgery makes it possible for patients to survive advanced liver cancer. In...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: Over a half-million women in the world get cervical cancer every year, with nearly 80 percent in developing countries. Human papilloma virus (HPV) causes the cancer and is therefore among the worst instigators of female cancer mortality worldwide. A vaccine is now available against the disease, but how effective is it, and can it save lives in poor, remote regions as well as wealthy areas? This...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: A killer flu outbreak isn't just a developing-world nightmare. The influenza virus is so adaptable that the West is as vulnerable as anywhere else. This program outlines the history of influenza and explores current research into what steps, if any, might prevent a future flu pandemic. Viewers are shown how the virus mutates to resist vaccines and has an uncanny ability to jump species...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: At an overwhelmed hospital in Uttar Pradesh, India, young children struggle for their lives. The threat initially appears like the flu or other illnesses, so it often goes misdiagnosed and treated with useless antibiotics until a more experienced doctor sees the patient. By then, it is often too late to prevent either death or severe brain damage. The film provides a glimpse of India's 2005...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: It is estimated that every 30 seconds a child dies from malaria. Medicines continue to be the main tool in fighting it-but, with growing resistance to existing drugs, there is an urgent need to discover new ones and distribute them at affordable prices in poor, disease-endemic countries. The major obstacle to the discovery of new anti-malarials is the lack of global investment in drug research...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: Virtually every child in the world, rich or poor, is infected early in life by a vicious bug called rotavirus. The lucky ones show no symptoms-they simply become immune. Others develop severe diarrhea. Given the best medicine, the victims recover. However, in developing countries, where even simple rehydration therapy may be hard to come by, rotavirus is lethal, killing around 400,000 children...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: On World AIDS Day 2003, WHO and UNAIDS released a detailed and concrete plan to reach the 3 by 5 target of providing antiretroviral treatment to three million people living with AIDS in developing countries and those in transition by the end of 2005. It was a vital step toward the ultimate goal of providing universal access to AIDS treatment to all those who need it. This program travels to...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: Uganda is at a turning point in its fight against malaria. In Kampala's Mulago hospital, a staggering percentage of admissions are due to malaria and it is the highest cause of death amongst patients. The parasite is becoming resistant to the standard treatments, and infecting children of younger ages. Just as worrying-some mosquitoes are becoming immune to the insecticide commonly used on...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: While mosquito-borne diseases like malaria emerge from stagnant ponds and puddles, it is fast-running water, in conjunction with the blood-sucking black fly, that creates a breeding ground for river blindness. Black flies carry a microscopic nematode larva that, thanks to a penny-sized nodule under the skin, can be easily detected after it has grown and reproduced inside a human host, but not...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011