Unmasked: We All Breathe / Tuberculosis

AIDS-Fondet and Médecins Sans Frontières Denmark, in collaboration with Global Health Film Days, are inviting you to a film screening of Unmasked: We All Breathe – a documentary film that, through three personal stories, tells about the fear stigma and pain that follow a diagnosis of tuberculosis (TB) for millions of people all over the world.

Every year at least 10 million people fall ill with TB, including 500,000 with multidrug-resistant TB. In 2021 alone, 1.6 million people died of TB – a significant increase from 1.2 million in 2019. With the COVID-19 pandemic’s destructive consequences for the global response to the disease, there’s currently a huge global need to ensure better access to effective prevention, diagnostic and treatment of TB if we are to get even close to achieving SDG 3.3 on ending the tuberculosis pandemic by 2030.

Unmasked: We All Breathe from 2019 follows Zolelwa, Arlette and Dalene – two medical doctors and a medical student in South Africa who all fall ill with multidrug-resistant TB. This form of tuberculosis is resistant to certain antibiotics used in treating TB. Even though it is an ancient disease and the world’s deadliest infectious disease, the most widely used diagnostics and treatments are ineffective and followed by strong side effects. Zolelwa describes her treatment “as being injected with lava” – with only a 40% chance of survival.

The film is a strong portrait of three women who, as part of their own healing, start fighting for better treatment for TB, ending the stigma and isolation that TB patients experience – and, not the least, mobilizing the necessary political will to finally achieve a world without TB.

EVENT After the film screening, the organizers are inviting you to an informal dialogue about the importance of access to effective prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of tuberculosis, as well as fighting the stigma and burden that especially vulnerable and marginalized people experience when they are hit by the disease. The film screening and panel discussion are part of creating more awareness and action globally to end the tuberculosis pandemic – a mission where also Denmark can play a significant role. The panel will consist of members of Parliament, an expert/researcher, and a TB survivor and -activist.

16:45 Welcome and introduction to the film (Médecins Sans Frontières Denmark)
17:00 Film screening: Unmasked: We All Breathe
17:50 Informal panel discussion at Asta Bar
18:20 Reception
19:00 End of event

Buy your ticket here. 

Watch the film trailer here.

Ashleigh Hamilton, Emma Watts
USA, 2019
DCP, 40 min.
English subtitles
Allowed over 15 years