Rx for Survival: A Global Health Challenge — Season 1, Episode 5: Back to the Basics
60 min • 1 season, 6 episodes • ★ 10.0/10
Episode synopsis
Ever since sailors noticed that scurvy could be prevented with citrus fruits, it has been clear that illness could be caused by a lack of certain nutrients. While nutrient-enriched products have reduced diseases caused by vitamin deficiency in the developed countries, the problem continues to plague the developing world. And many in poorer countries suffer from the twin problems of poor nutrition and unsafe water, which create a disease burden that is almost unbearable. Back to the Basics explores the connection between health and the essential requirements that so many people take for granted. It also examines how an overabundance of nutrition — in the form of over-consumption — is causing an epidemic of obesity that is spreading across the globe.
About Rx for Survival: A Global Health Challenge
From vaccines to antibiotics, clean water to nutrition, bio-terror threats to the HIV/AIDS pandemic, the six-part series Rx for Survival: A Global Health Challenge tells the compelling stories of global health challenges and successes. Employing both historical dramatic sequences and poignant current documentary stories, the series showcases key milestones in public health history, such as the eradication of smallpox, alongside modern and future challenges, including SARS, a potential global flu pandemic and recovery from the Asian tsunami catastrophe.