Five Days After the Catastrophe

In August 2005, Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans, causing severe flooding and turning the city into literal ruins. The Memorial Medical Center found itself trapped, without electricity and unable to receive help from anywhere. Thousands of people—from critically ill patients to relatives of the medical staff—were cut off from the outside world for five days. Doctors had to make difficult decisions: whom to save first, who was eligible for evacuation, and who might not survive until then. Months later, when this horror was behind, some medical staff were arrested for administering lethal doses of medications to hopeless patients… What really happened at the Memorial Medical Center? Mass murder? Or did the doctors, sacrificing their careers, take this step to ease the final hours of the dying? Sheri Fink will provide answers to these questions, demonstrating how human behavior changes in critical situations.