Megachurches, Mission Trips and White Saviors: HBO’s ‘Savior Complex’ Dissects How Renee Bach Caused Havoc in Uganda
28.09.2023 - 22:01
/ variety.com
Sophia Scorziello editor Renee Bach was 19 when she claims to have heard a calling from God telling her to travel to Uganda on a missionary trip to save children from starvation, poverty and deadly diseases. In 2009, she moved to Jinja, Uganda and opened a charity called Serving His Children. There, with a high-school diploma and zero medical education or professional licenses, Bach spearheaded treatments for babies and young children, which included hooking up IV drips, feeding sessions, prescribing medications, giving blood transfusions and handling other procedures.
From 2011 to 2015, Serving His Children ran as a non-governmental organization. During this time, a large number of children died under Bach’s care, and soon after, Ugandan officials shut SHC down. Bach was run out of the country, and returned to the U.S., where she is currently facing a lawsuit from a Ugandan human rights attorney, based on the testimony of two mothers who lost their children under Bach’s care.
Now, HBO’s three-part docuseries “Savior Complex” — which is now streaming on Max — takes a look into the problem that is Bach and SHC. While the mortality rate at Bach’s facility was high, so was the mortality rate at local, government-operated hospitals in Uganda. The series ponders whether it would have been better for Bach to have done nothing, as opposed to give some care — and asks why she never went to medical school nor hired Ugandan doctors to lead her NGO.
But it doesn’t just put the pressure on Bach. At one point, head nurse Constance Alonyo, whom Bach worked closely with at SHC, says no one involved in this story was doing everything perfectly. “Let he who has never sinned pick a stone and throw it at Renee,” Alonyo says.