Radiolab again. This episode is very moving. What happens when people have to ration medical care in extreme situations?

The story focuses first on Sheri Fink’s reporting of “Five Days at Memorial“, then on a public forum in Baltimore, and finally on an person who needed oxygen during a disaster in Haiti.

After Hurricane Katrina hit and the levees broke, at Memorial Hospital in New Orleans there were 5 days of serious trauma because of limited resources. At several points, people had to make difficult choices about whose needs would be given priority. Then discussion started to creep further toward other difficult choices that might have to be made…

This is extraordinary.

Listen to the story about a woman who taught a 27 year old Nicaraguan man how to understand language for the first time. “Something about his eyes caught her attention.” She uses sign to communicate, and he echoes everything she signs – right back at her. “Visual echolalia.” She could see intelligence in his eyes, but realised that he had no language; he didn’t even know he was deaf.

“What have you been doing for 27 years?” she wonders.

Listen for the moment when everything changes. It brings tears to my eyes when i hear what happened.

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via Words – Radiolab.

From the people at Radiolab. These 2 men make radio that seems to flow in a kind of liquid conversational story. The narrative is so beautifully woven from multiple voices, without signalling when the voice changes.

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