Painkillers - What's Going on in the Body?

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Every day experience of pain is what scientists call nociception. Receptors allow sodium ions to flood to the nerve cells, and that sends a series of signals all the way through your spine, up to your brain. For longer term pain, people have got pain for more than six months. It's really difficult to find solutions to those problems.

Our correspondent reports from eastern Congo, where a three-decade-long conflict has killed thousands, and forced more than five million people from their homes--with no end in sight. Researchers are searching for better analgesics: ones that reduce pain without the risk of addiction or corollary physiological damage. And a contest in southern Alaska to select the internet’s favourite fat bear.