South African documentary, The Doctor and the Miracle Pill, premieres at Jozi Film Festival on 23 February at 16h00 at The Bioscope in Johannesburg.
The Doctor and the Miracle Pill is the story of how a comatose patient accidentally woke up after being given a sleeping pill and how it has and is changing people’s lives. Fifteen years later, after this miraculous discovery, Dr Wally Nel, a general practitioner from a mining town in the east of Johannesburg, has treated hundreds of brain-injured patients globally with the Stilnox sleeping pill. Recently, a man in South Africa awoke from a seven-year-long coma after being given the pill.
Despite the evidence of the sleeping pill’s effectiveness on brain-injured patients, the endorsement of the Pretoria-based Steve Biko Academic Hospital’s Department of Nuclear Medicine, and two accomplished professors’ of nuclear medicine’s support; the manufacturing drug company does not backing this use for their sleeping pill.
In the meantime, Dr Nel, a grandfather of six, uses his limited resources to campaign for the pill to be recognised as an official treatment for brain injuries.
After the screening, Dr Nel will be available for a Q & A session.
The Director and the Miracle Pill was directed and produced by Rina Jooste and is an Afrikaans-language film with English subtitles. The movie was produced with the assistance of the National Film and Video Foundation.
View the trailer here: http://youtu.be/8QxJIMJqIvk.
