gautamnarula
Joined Jan 2016
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gautamnarula's rating
Before I saw Forgotten Plague, I was only vaguely familiar with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS). I assumed CFS was simply a feeling of constant tiredness: something that certainly had a very real and substantial impact on your life (imagine how productive you are after a sleepless night or two compared to after a good night's sleep), but one that still allowed sufferers to live normal lives. How wrong I was. In the film, one of the people responsible for naming the disease "Chronic Fatigue Syndrome", a faculty member at Harvard Medical School, apologized on camera for giving it that name, as it trivialized this debilitating disease and led uninformed people like me to vastly underestimate the severity of the illness.
The film follows young journalist Ryan Prior, a sufferer of CFS, as he travels around the country trying to understand the origins of his illness and why it has been ignored and woefully underfunded by the medical community for so long. The film points out that while CFS causes the same amount of lost economic productivity as Parkinson's, CFS research receives a paltry $4 million in annual funding, compared to over $100 million in annual funding for Parkinson's. For the one million people suffering from CFS in the United States, that's grim news.
Forgotten Plague masterfully interleaves commentary from experts and researchers on the history and genesis of the disease with heartbreaking stories from its victims. There's no barrier between policy and its effects here. One moment, we hear from research scientist about the political and bureaucratic hurdles preventing any funding increases, and the next we hear from a woman who contemplates suicide and begs for a return to a normal life. An interview with a doctor who first noticed CFS in the 1980s is interspersed with that of a young weightlifter who now struggles to even stand. For perhaps the first time, policymakers can see the firsthand results of their refusal to fund CFS research.
For us on the outside, it's easy to think of medicine as this relentless, advancing automaton that is indefinitely self-improving. Forgotten Plague shows us just how arbitrary research funding can be, and just how important it is for us to care about it. If you or a loved one suffers from an incurable disease, this affects you too. Watch this film.
The film follows young journalist Ryan Prior, a sufferer of CFS, as he travels around the country trying to understand the origins of his illness and why it has been ignored and woefully underfunded by the medical community for so long. The film points out that while CFS causes the same amount of lost economic productivity as Parkinson's, CFS research receives a paltry $4 million in annual funding, compared to over $100 million in annual funding for Parkinson's. For the one million people suffering from CFS in the United States, that's grim news.
Forgotten Plague masterfully interleaves commentary from experts and researchers on the history and genesis of the disease with heartbreaking stories from its victims. There's no barrier between policy and its effects here. One moment, we hear from research scientist about the political and bureaucratic hurdles preventing any funding increases, and the next we hear from a woman who contemplates suicide and begs for a return to a normal life. An interview with a doctor who first noticed CFS in the 1980s is interspersed with that of a young weightlifter who now struggles to even stand. For perhaps the first time, policymakers can see the firsthand results of their refusal to fund CFS research.
For us on the outside, it's easy to think of medicine as this relentless, advancing automaton that is indefinitely self-improving. Forgotten Plague shows us just how arbitrary research funding can be, and just how important it is for us to care about it. If you or a loved one suffers from an incurable disease, this affects you too. Watch this film.