Opinion – Front Line: After the Universe

In 2020, a dramatic moment of the pandemic, I, a doctor who loves stories, received a very special invitation. Producer Luciano Reck asked me for advice, initially on the script for a film in which the protagonists would be a young woman with a chronic illness and a resident physician.

Through Luciano I met Diego Freitas, responsible for the original story, director and co-writer, along with Ana Reber. It was he who introduced me to Nina, a young woman who lives with systemic lupus erythematosus, a disease in which a person’s immunity attacks the body’s own structures since childhood. She dreams of being a pianist in the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra, but the worsening of her illness puts her on the kidney transplant waiting list and makes her dependent on hemodialysis, increasing her challenge. From the meeting with Gabriel, the resident physician, Nina starts to consider her dream possible.

I have already met and cared for many people similar to Nina, who need to take care of chronic diseases, sometimes serious, being often stigmatized, while facing the challenges of growing up in early adulthood like other young people who are considered healthy.

Passionate about Diego’s story, I had the opportunity to follow the production and materialize the dream. It was beautiful, a breath in such hard times of a pandemic.

Nina was played by Giulia Be, with an already successful career in music, in her film debut; Gabriel, by Henrique Zaga, a young actor already experienced in productions of great international success. I fell even more in love with Nina de Giulia and Gabriel de Henrique.

I hope this story reaches people living with lupus, who are on hemodialysis, who are awaiting transplants, or who have other chronic conditions that require care, and inspires them to dream, not in a way of denying their conditions, but following through with the necessary care. so that they can develop their full potential.

I also hope this story motivates people to donate organs. Brazil has the largest public transplant system in the world, thanks to the Unified Health System (SUS), but unfortunately many people still die in the queue for lack of a donor.

After the Universe premieres today, 10/27, on Netflix Brazil, and I am grateful for the privilege of having watched as a privileged viewer this story being built.

After the Universe there is still a passion.