New SBS doco charts Dr Jennifer MacDiarmid and Dr Himanshu Brahmbhatt’s epic decades-long cancer quest

It’s been a long road for Australian cancer scientists, Dr Jennifer MacDiarmid and Dr Himanshu Brahmbhatt, who started their company EnGeneIC 24 years ago, guided by an unshakeable belief they could change the way the world treats cancer.

In the last two weeks, their world-first disruptive cancer-beating technology, EnGeneIC Dream Vector (EDV) — a microscopic “Trojan Horse” that slips inside cancer cells and destroys them from within, sparing healthy cells — commenced large-scale human trials in the United States, fast tracked by the US Food and Drug Administration.

It’s a huge moment for the pair, whose journey has been captured over a decade in a two-part SBS documentary, The Cancer Killers, screening on SBS on Demand.

“It’s a big game changer,” MacDiarmid said of the blind second-line medical trials, which have begun in the first of 144 patients.

“We have had good results in our little trial in Australia in pancreatic cancer, where we increased the overall survival dramatically for people who had failed everything and had had lots of lines of treatment and drug resistance, and they were ready to go to the hospice.”

The pair’s work with EDV was first brought to a wider audience in 2007, when they were featured on ABC’s Australian Story.

At that stage the company had had success in animals, but their discovery was yet to be trialled in humans.

Eighteen long years later, that dream is now being realised on a larger scale.

As well as being trialled to treat pancreatic cancer, the treatment is also being trialled in low-survival cancers like glioma (a type of brain cancer) and mesothelioma, with the scientists hoping the technology can be used to fight an array of diseases.

“We have a number of compassionate case studies who are all doing remarkably well,” MacDiarmid said of the local trials.

“Just before you rang, one of the doctors from Melbourne who has got two of them called to say how well they were.

“They are out 20 months after starting the EDVs, which is unheard of for recurrent brain cancer, glioma.”

The scientists believe their new approach has the potential to eliminate the debilitating side effects of chemotherapy, “including nausea, vomiting and hair loss, while preserving the body’s natural defences.”

MacDiarmid and Brahmbhatt’s years-long quest to develop their technology is captured in the SBS documentary, providing a behind-the-scenes look at the challenges they have faced along the way.

Through the documentary, you see both doctors staying resolute in their belief in the technology they have developed from scratch, even when up against enormous obstacles.

“It was a bit surreal seeing it condensed so much,” MacDiarmid said of the experience of watching their journey unfold through the two parts of the documentary.

“I thought it might have ended up being a miniseries!”

The film follows MacDiarmid and Brahmbhatt, looking back at the early human trials in Melbourne in 2009 to now, as they stand on the cusp of beginning the next phase in the United States, where their trials will begin over a six-site clinical trial, which includes one of the world’s leading cancer research sites, Columbia University’s Irving Cancer Research Centre in New York.

The film’s producer and director, Judy Rhymer, says she felt “inspired” by the pioneering scientists as she followed their quest.

“We’ve been swept up in an extraordinary journey through the fast-moving world of biotechnology, full of innovation, resilience, and hope,” she said of the experience of filming.

“With passion and perseverance, these scientists navigate the path from the laboratory to patient bedside, determined to make a lasting difference.

“It’s a story of dedication, discovery, and the power of science to change lives.”

The Cancer Killers is streaming on SBS on Demand.