A montage of patients and people from around the world including the USA, Australia, Canada, China, India, Uganda, South Africa, Hong Kong, Singapore, Georgia and Ireland accompany statistics from the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC), Global Access to Pain Relief Initiative (GAPRI).

“4 of every 5 people globally lack access to essential pain medicines.”

“Over 5 billion people are affected worldwide.”

“3.6 million people will die with untreated severe pain from cancer and HIV this year.”

“99.9% of those deaths will be in low and middle-income countries.”

“15% of the world currently uses 94% of the world’s medicinal opioids.”

Ellis Paul (USA) is one of the leading voices in American songwriting and one of the top songwriters to emerge out of the fertile Boston folk scene.

Dr Frank Ferris (USA) reflects, “As I look around the world I see that about a billion people in the world have access to decent pain management and palliative care. That leaves almost 6 billion people with virtually no access to good analgesics or health care professionals who know how to appropriately administer them. To me this is a crisis.”