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there's much more purpose to nature documentaries.

no one would care about any of these animals or there plights without them. zoos and nature documentaries are the biggest drivers or interest and donations in the protecting the natural world.

not interfering with what is happening is more than just a nature documentary thing, it's a journalism thing in general. the only reason journalists get access to the places and things they do is because they don't interfere. interfering with the natural world is a hard thing to do right. usually the obvious answer is the wrong one when it comes to preservation and restoration. and i mean sure, there's times when it's obvious that your interference wouldn't be a bad thing, but part of the point of following a code of ethics is to remove the human element. follow the code strictly and you will never cause harm.

imagine if a bbc earth filmmaker accidentally got an endangered animal in a remote area sick because he decided to remove a fish hook. that remote area would never allow anyone to film there again.

but generally, the goal of journalists is to show things as they are. to educate the world on the problem. to do that you must show the problem playing out without intervention. and if there is no problem, if it's just an animal being hunted then you'd likely be causing harm to something else by preventing it.

a journalist believes they can do more good by showing one child dying to the entire world than by using their talents with words and cameras to somehow save a single starving child. they went there in person to do what they think will be effective in the long term. you could also go there in person to get hands on and save the animals if you want. they are no more guilty of not saving these things than you are.