Bosnia, Rwanda, Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Pakistan. Just a few of the world's humanitarian and political crisis in the past years. Whether the result of war or nature, these disasters devastate populations and cripple health systems. Despite the immense dangers an difficulties of the work, one organization, Doctors Without Borders, has continually intervened at these front lines of overwhelming human need. Living in Emergency interweaves the stories of four volunteers with Doctors Without Borders as they struggle to provide emergency medical care under the most extreme conditions.
Two volunteers are new recruits: a 26yrs old Australian doctor stranded in a remote bush clinic and an American surgeon struggling to cope under the load of emergency cases in a shattered capital city. Two others are experienced field hands; a dynamic Head of Mission, valiantly trying to keep morale high and tensions under control, and an exhausted veteran, who has seen too much horror and wants out.
Amidst the chaos, each volunteer must confront the severe challenges of the work, the tough choices, and the limits of their own idealism.