COVID CENTURY—THE PANDEMIC PREPAREDNESS DILEMMA
MON, 12/5, 5:30pm, 98 min, BAY STREET THEATER
Zoom Q/A with Director Michael Wech and Andrew Botsford
If seats are still available, tickets may be purchased at the festival desk. Cash or Credit cards only
Director: Michael Wech
Producers: Leopold Hoesch, Peter Wolf
Editor: Andre Hammesfahr
Cinematographers: Karsten Hohmann, Johannes Imdahl, Sven Kiesche, Justin Lovett, Dan Soekov
In most peoples’ memories the Covid-19 pandemic started in the first weeks of spring 2020, but the decisive period for why the outbreak in Wuhan turned into an epidemic started much earlier. Covid Century highlights key moments of the first ten weeks after the discovery of the new disease that were crucial to the pandemic's global spread. Jeremy Farrar, one of the world's leading scientists, says, "We could have stopped the pandemic."
In a previously unseen manner, the investigative film by Michael Wech shows how the Chinese authorities withheld crucial information and impeded for weeks any attempt to share the identity of the new pathogen with the international community. This fatal delay circumvented global containment strategies hindering the development of much-needed, diagnostic tests and vaccines.
Michael Wech’s 2019 documentary Resistance Fighters, about the global antibiotics crisis, received the "Impact Award" at the Vancouver International Film Festival, the "Grand Prix" at the Pariscience Festival International du Film Scientifique and was nominated for the German Television Award.
Film is sponsored by Jason Katz