Where to Stream: Pandemic: How to Prevent an Outbreak

Powered by Reelgood

Pandemic: How To Prevent An Outbreak is a six-part docuseries that hopscotches the globe, discussing the possible sources of animal-borne flu viruses that could cause the next pandemic, how the worldwide healthcare system is ill-equipped to handle it, and how there are people on the bleeding edge of medical research racing the clock to come up with vaccines to handle these rapidly-mutating pathogens now and in the future. After all, it’s been over 100 years since the last pandemic, so we’re due. But can we beat the clock and prevent widespread damage from one?

PANDEMIC: HOW TO PREVENT AN OUTBREAK: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: Cars driving to a field in Butler County, PA. A man with long white hair surveys the scene, a cross on one end of the field.

The Gist: What the man, Dr. Dennis Carroll, director of USAID’s Emerging Threats Unit, is doing in this field is showing that it was a mass grave. Via ultrsound and other technologies, a team maps out where all the bodies were buried, one of many mass graves towns build to bury victims of the H1N1 outbreak in 1918. That pandemic overwhelmed the healthcare system back then and killed 50-100 million people, on a planet that had less than 2 billion people. Now, with the almost 8 billion people on Earth and the ability to travel a lot easier, a new pandemic could kill hundreds of millions, and it seems that such a pandemic’s arrival is a matter of when, not if.

The first part not only discusses sources, but spends a lot of time showing how healthcare systems in big cities and small towns, in countries as diverse as the U.S. and India, are struggling to figure out how to respond to an outbreak. In New York, Dr. Syra Madad heads NYC Health & Hospitals effort to prepare the city’s public hospital system for the next pandemic. Inspired at an early age by the 1995 film Outbreak, she’s dedicated her career to making sure hospitals are ready for the onslaught.

We also see Holly Goracke, the only doctor working her shift at a tiny county hospital in Oklahoma; she’s afraid that rural areas like hers will be left behind during a large-scale outbreak. In Jaipur, India, Dr. Dinesh Vijay has to deal with advanced seasonal flu cases in people who live in the rural areas of the state of Rajasthan, who don’t get proper treatment locally and often come to the city for treatment when things have advanced to near-fatal levels.

But we also go to San Francisco to meet Jake Glanville and Sarah Ives, who are researching a universal flu vaccine, in a company that’s completely self-funded. But they’re up to the point in their research where they need millions (a tiny sum compared to what big pharma spends on R&D every year) to go to human trials, and the only source they think they can get the money from are benefactors like Bill Gates.

Our Take: Pandemic: How To Prevent An Outbreak is produced by Zero Point Zero Productions, best known for Anthony Bourdain’s various docuseries and the Netflix docuseries Broken and Rotten. Because of the wide-ranging nature of the series, each episode has multiple directors, and the first episode sometimes had that feel. Because each episode is split into chapters, there was a sense that there were a 4-6 mini-moves in an hour-long episode. It made the episode a touch disjointed. But disjointed or not, the subject matter had us sitting up straight and paying attention.

Look, we all listen intently to the news when flu season starts every fall; this year’s flu season is the worst in decades, there’s a shortage of vaccines, the vaccines aren’t 100% effective, etc. As a nation, we’re all on edge whenever we hear about a new case of swine or avian flu, something with a new number by the H and N in its technical name. But Pandemic presents an urgency about the matter than even hysterical local news broadcasts haven’t been able to communicate.

Mostly, that urgency lies in our lack of preparedness for an outbreak. We know what’s coming, and we know how poorly the worldwide healthcare system reacted the last time there was one. The fact that it’s 100 years later and we’re likely even less prepared is something that could keep you awake at night. The series will go into more details in subsequent episodes, but as an intro, it was sobering.

Perhaps that’s why the filmmakers decided to balance the gloom and doom with the researchers pushing to make a universal flu vaccine. But even there, the researchers are facing an uphill battle, given the lack of funding.

Gates says in voice over that the flu is one of humanity’s biggest threats, but “we’re not ready.”

Sleeper Star: Dr. Carroll is used for a fair amount of voice over in his segments, and his dulcet tones belie the urgency he’s trying to convey. But that’ll likely get the message across better.

Most Pilot-y Line: Did we need to see Ives kill the vibe during a dinner party by talking about that the next pandemic is only a matter of time?

Our Call: STREAM IT. Pandemic: How To Prevent An Outbreak illustrates an important issue in very relatable, human terms, even if the filmmakers ping-pong around the planet in order to make their point. We hope subsequent episodes focus on their topics a little better.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, , , Fast , , Billboard and elsewhere.

Stream Pandemic: How To Prevent An Outbreak On Netflix