Programme Overview
Description
Ellie Simmonds, five-time gold Paralympics winner, is used to an environment where difference is celebrated; but now she’s investigating a controversial new drug that some people argue could bring an end to dwarfism.
A pioneering drug is coming on the market that promises to make children with Achondroplasia – Ellie’s form of dwarfism - grow close to average height. Achondroplasia is a genetic condition that is the most common type of dwarfism in the UK, and the new treatment raises the question: if cutting edge medicine can stop disability in its tracks, should we use it?
For Ellie, this is a deeply personal documentary as she interrogates her own beliefs and preconceptions, while grappling with the dilemmas that emerging break-through medicines pose for society. Travelling around the UK and the US, Ellie explores all sides of this contentious debate, meeting families embarking on the drug trial, others who feel treatment would have positively impacted their lives as well as those who are proud of their identity and question the aims of the drug.
In this timely investigation, Ellie also reflects and draws on her own experiences and asks wider questions about the relationship between science and disability.