Four stars for Five Days at Memorial: When a hospital turns into hell | On our Playlist

“You expect this in a Third World country, but not in America,” sighs Dr. Anna Pou as she surveys the damage at Memorial Hospital in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina that killed 1,833 people in 2005.

The hospital is struggling with leaks, the broken water reaches the front door, patients are scattered throughout the building, homeless residents have been sheltered, the electricity goes out all the time and temperatures rise to unacceptable heights.

The medical staff is also exhausted. There is no help from outside, the most severely ill cannot be transported and countless lives are at stake. In this panic situation, the leadership makes a drastic decision on which this drama series is based.

On 45 hopeless and untransportable patients, euthanasia is performed by giving them a fatal overdose of morphine. The discovery of the bodies leads to an in-depth investigation in which the actions of the doctors involved are uncovered. Who made the decisions?

The main suspect is Dr. Anna Pou, a role of Vera Farmiga, known for Up in the Air and Bates Motel. Pou has a Christian background, is highly regarded, is perhaps the most empathetic doctor in the building, yet she probably gave the fatal injections.

Five Days at Memorial focuses on her, how she is subsequently charged and then ends up in a legal and media spectacle with – given the watertight evidence – a surprising outcome.

This true drama will not reassure everyone in the final episodes. Hard nuts are being cracked about medical ethics, but no one seems to have a satisfactory answer.