The Documentary Podcast

Vaccines are seen as a way out of the coronavirus pandemic; a way to stop transmission and have fewer patients in hospital. Host Nuala McGovern shares different experiences of vaccination and hospitalisation. For some who have been vaccinated, infection is still possible, but hospitalisation is expected to be less likely. Two guests describe their reactions to getting a positive test, after having Covid jabs, and how the virus affected them. We consider too those who are hesitant about the Covid vaccine, despite the dangers of catching the disease.

Syrian born reporter Lina Sinjab presents a special series from Assignment’s award winning archive on the ten years of civil war in her country.

This week she introduces Tim Whewell’s programme from 2016 about what happened to a local football team in Aleppo province in the early years of the civil war:

A fuzzy team photo from the 1980s sent Tim on a journey to track down the football players in the picture; the men who were once the champions of Aleppo province. Mare’a, their small hometown in northern Syria, had by then become a war zone - bombed by the Assad regime, besieged by Islamic State, even subjected to a mustard gas attack. And the civil war had torn through what was once a close knit band of friends - some had become pro-rebel, some pro-regime. They were scattered across Syria and beyond, some were fighting near Mare'a, some were living in refugee camps abroad. In this moving story about how war fractures and divides a community, Tim hears about the ordeals the men had suffered since they won that football cup and asks whether they could ever be reunited?

At the end of the programme, Lina catches up with Tim to find out what’s happened to the team members since 2016.

(Image: Mare’a’s cup-winning football team, 1983. Credit: Mare'a football team’s archive)

On 25 May 1986, 6.5 million people did the impossible; they joined hands to form the world’s longest human chain, from New York to Los Angeles. But far from being a simple stunt, Hands Across America was raising money to fight hunger and homelessness in the world’s richest country. Did it succeed? Aleks Krotoski was 11 years old when she stood in the sunshine between her mother and a stranger and held their hands for those 15 minutes 35 years ago. She speaks with the organisers, the people who participated, and the people who received the donations, and discovers that Hands Across America didn’t just feed the hungry, but led the social networking revolution as well.

Now that scientists have created a Covid-19 vaccine in record time, the race is on to vaccinate the world. Public health professor Devi Sridhar follows the journey of the Covid vaccine from factory to arm as she goes behind the scenes of the rollout. Speaking to health leaders, politicians and experts, we see how the world is responding and look at how long it might take to vaccinate enough people.

On 12 April 1961, cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became an explorer like none other before him, going faster and further than any human in history, into what had always been the impenetrable and infinite unknown. Raised in poverty during the World War Two, the one-time foundry worker and a citizen of the Soviet Union became the first human to fly above the Earth. Dr Kevin Fong tells the story of how 27-year-old Yuri Gagarin came to launch a new chapter in the history of exploration and follows the cosmonaut’s one hour flight around the Earth.

After 11 days of conflict, a ceasefire has been agreed between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas. The violence in that time killed more than 250 people, most of them in Gaza. During this past week, host Nuala McGovern has been hearing conversations from both Palestinians and Israelis about what it has been like to be living under bombardment. They talk about their lives and hopes for the future.

Syrian born reporter Lina Sinjab presents a special series from Assignment’s award winning archive on the 10 years of civil war in her country. In 2013 Lina recorded an audio diary of her final days in Damascus where she was working for the BBC. In this intimate and revealing programme, she combines dramatic scenes and interview material with her own story as she discusses her thoughts, feelings and encounters before she left the country. Ten years on, series producer Lucy Ash interviews Lina on what it felt like to listen back to those stories.

(Image: Lina Sinjab. Credit: Sima Ajalyakin)

London-based broadcaster Edward Adoo and US DJ T Storm team up to discuss the experiences of black people who are stopped and searched in their countries. Together they hear the personal stories of others from all over the world who’ve suffered the humiliation of what many who have been stopped say is apparent racial stereotyping. They also talk to researchers and policy makers about the psychological trauma suffered by those subjected to stop and search; and also look at arguments for the practice and ask whether its ever fair to stop and search.

Dr Solelwa Sifumba in Johannesburg, South Africa, recently left the profession after experiencing such chronic anxiety that it even led to her considering taking her own life. She is joined by two fellow doctors in the UK, as they discuss burnout and the mental health challenges of working in constant crisis mode since the pandemic began. They tell host Nuala McGovern about the difficulty in their profession to say they are not ok. We also talk to two therapists in the United States and UK.

Jacques Cousteau called Mexico’s Sea of Cortez, ‘the aquarium of the world’. It is home to one of the most critically endangered species on earth. The vaquita is a small porpoise facing total extinction, whose numbers have dwindled to less than a dozen. In particular, the vaquita get caught in the nets used to catch totoaba. Casting nets for this large marine fish is illegal. But the totoaba’s swim bladder is believed to have potent medicinal properties in China, and sells for thousands of dollars in a trade controlled by Mexican organised crime. So efforts to save the vaquita have brought conflict to poor fishing communities in northern Baja California – people who often rely on an illicit income from totoaba. On New Year’s Eve, 2020 one fisherman was killed and another seriously injured in an altercation between local boats and an NGO ship patrolling to stop the sinking of illegal nets that kill the vaquita. Linda Pressly reports from the coast of Baja California on a dangerous clash of interests. Can the vaquita be saved?

Producer: Michael Gallagher

(Image: Illustration of a vaquita in Mexico’s Sea of Cortez. Credit: Greenpeace/Marcelo Otero)