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Witnessing follows three Black families as they navigate the realities of living with and caring for someone with the disease, Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). ALS is an incurable disease that impacts the nervous system and erodes the body. For Black communities, systemic inequities delay diagnosis, limit treatment options, exacerbate disability, and constrain access to care. Through intimate storytelling, the short documentary amplifies voices too often absent from the rare disease narrative.
Vanessa Jackson recounts her daughter Naishia’s struggle with fragmented medical care and bias, transforming grief into collective action. Michelle Francis and her family confront the uncertainties of a genetic form of ALS, developing pedigree charts dating back to the 1800s, despite stigma and inherited risk. Maceo Carter, his wife Maya, and their children balance caregiving, work, school, and the harsh economics of illness, revealing the relentless intimacy of care.
Witnessing exposes the structural harms and emotional toll of ALS in Black communities while foregrounding joy, love, and resistance. Beyond awareness, this film demands systemic change—challenging healthcare institutions to recognize that delayed diagnoses and exclusion from care are not just biomedical failures, but bioethical ones. Witnessing is not only about survival and awareness—it is an immediate call for health justice.
Directed by Chelsey Roxanne Carter and Michael Tyner (USA)