Universal+ announces the premiere this May 15 of the new installment of DR. DEATH. The anthology series is back with a new doctor and a new story.
Inspired by the successful podcast about true crimes from Wondery, the new installment of DR. DEATH tells the story of the Italian doctor Paolo Macchiarini, played by Edgar Ramirez (The Bourne Ultimatum, The Girl on the Train), who rose to fame after performing the world’s first synthetic organ transplant. The emerging eminence of medicine will see his success and prosperity questioned by revelations that will call into question his shady medical methods and procedures.
The eight (8) episode narrative of this new installment moves back and forth in time to reveal how Macchiarini performed experimental surgeries on patients without scientific support, tricked the medical community into supporting his misdeeds, and seduced his former fiancée, the journalist. investigation Benita Alexander, starring Mandy Moore (This Is Us).
Macchiarini not only lied about his research and medical advances, but also about his personal life in a story full of lies and secrets with deadly consequences.
To learn a little more about these chilling events, here are some details behind the true story that inspired this new installment of DR. DEATH:
WHAT DID PAOLO MACCHIARINI DO?
From 2011 to 2014, Macchiarini implanted synthetic tracheas into the throats of patients at Sweden’s prestigious Karolinska University Hospital. The artificial tracheas were seeded with stem cells extracted from the patients’ own bone marrow, which the professional said would allow them to function as living airways. The patients later died from complications believed to have arisen from the operations.
In total, Macchiarini would have repeated this dangerous action, without scientific support, in more than 20 patients from Spain, Russia, Iceland, Great Britain and the United States.
Dr. Paolo Macchiarini, once considered a pioneer in the field of regenerative medicine, first came under scrutiny in 2013, when four of his Karolinska Institute colleagues (Karl-Henrik Grinnemo, Matthias Corbascio, Thomas Fux and Oscar Simonson) began to express concerns about their work.
DR. DEATH includes in fiction these doctors such as Dr. Anders Svensson (Gustaf Hammarsten), Dr. Ana Lasbrey (Ashley Madekwe) and Dr. Nathan Gamelli (Luke Kirby).
“We saw that patients who received an artificial trachea were not doing well after the procedure, so we began to investigate whether there were animal studies or other data to support that the grafts work in patients,” Grinnemo stated to Retraction Watch in 2017. “But as soon as we started asking questions to Paolo Macchiarini, his team started acting strangely. “We filed a complaint so that Macchiarini would stop performing the operations, because they were dangerous and the patients suffered a lot.”the professional completed in his testimony.
Find out the outcome of this chilling story starting May 15, exclusively on Universal+ for all of Latin America.
DATA SHEET:
- Director / Screenwriter / Executive Producer: Ashley Michel Hoban.
- Executive producer: Patrick Macmanus.
- Executive producers: Todd Black (Escape Artists), Jason Blumenthal (Escape Artists), Steve Tisch (Escape Artists), Taylor Latham (Escape Artists), Aaron Hart (Wondery), Hernan Lopez (Wondery), Marshall Lewy (Wondery), Linda Gase.
- Director/Executive Producer: Jennifer Morrison (Episodes 1-4).
- Director: Laura Belsey (Episodes 5-8).
- Distribution: Edgar Ramirez, Mandy Moore, Luke Kirby, Ashley Madekwe, Gustaf Hammarsten.
- Produced by: UCP, a division of Universal Studio Group.
- Format: Mini series of 8 episodes x 60 minutes.
