Press conference with Minister Butler, Melbourne – 5 May 2026

ADAM HORSBURGH, CEO THE ALFRED HOSPITAL: Every day here at the Alfred we see challenges that people with cancer face, and our clinicians and researchers are committed to pushing the boundaries of what's possible in cancer treatment, including through advances in CAR-T therapy. In partnership with our colleagues at Peter Mac, we’ve worked together to turn research and innovation into care that truly makes a difference to our patients. So, today marks a really important moment in that ongoing effort. To share more about this, please welcome the Federal Minister for Health and Ageing, the Honourable Mark Butler.
 
MARK BUTLER, MINISTER FOR HEALTH AND AGEING, MINISTER FOR DISABILITY AND THE NDIS: It's a great pleasure to be joined by such an amazing range of clinicians and supporters.
 
This Alfred Precinct is really one of the great health treatment and research precincts in the country. They often vie with the RPA in Sydney for the mantle of the leading research and teaching hospital in in the country. I think Alfred's number one at the moment. I'm in Melbourne, so I'm going to say Alfred's number 1 at the moment. And this exciting announcement today is just another example of why the Alfred is looked to by the rest of the country as one of the great clinical and research leaders of Australia.
 
I want to pay credit to Myeloma Australia for their advocacy in this area, particularly over the last few years where I think we've seen the community consciousness and awareness of the challenge of multiple myeloma really step up. And that in part is due to the organisation itself, to the terrific advocacy of people like Jeff Browne, who's here, obviously, Sandy Roberts, a much-loved Australian. And I think today is another step in making the journey of Australians, 14,000 or so Australians who are living with multiple myeloma, just that little bit easier and just that more filled with hope.
 
For a long time, there were no new treatments on the horizon for this condition and, as a result, the five-year survival rate for this particular form of cancer, the key metric on survival, didn't really shift from about 1 in 2, while we saw improvements in so many other cancer areas. And that, in large part, was due to the fact for more than a dozen years we didn't see a new treatment funded by governments in this area.
 
But just over the last 2 months, we've added two new terrific immunotherapies to the PBS; Darzalex late last year and Elrexfio a couple of months ago, which are starting to give new hope to patients with this condition. And today, we add to that with a third new treatment funded by government and that is Carvykti, a CAR-T cell therapy that has been on the horizon for a while but now we can finally say will be delivered, funded by government in this hospital, at Peter Mac and, over time, in other hospitals around Australia. I'm going to let Andrew talk about the terrific characteristics of this treatment, but it genuinely is a gamechanger. CAR-T cell therapy is an amazing new treatment that just reminds us how lucky we are to be living in this turbocharged period of discovery.
 
But all of these treatments, although they are life-changing, life-saving, highly effective treatments, are also very expensive treatments. So, funding them through programs like the PBS or the highly specialised treatment chapter of the hospital funding agreement we have with states and territories, is obviously critical to enabling patient access. This treatment would cost around $200,000, which is obviously beyond the means of most patients with multiple myeloma. Announcing today that it will be funded through the hospital funding agreement that we have and territories governments will genuinely be a game-changer for hundreds of patients every year who we think will be able to access this treatment.
 
I really want to thank Myeloma Australia, this terrific patient organisation that has been coming to Canberra, talking to state governments, really pressing the case for more attention on this really challenging condition that so many Australians face. I want to thank J&J for their patient way in which they've engaged with governments to bring us to today so that we can fund this through the hospital funding agreement. And I want to thank leading hospitals like the Alfred for showing other hospitals around the country how to be able to do this and leading the way, but also treating patients who are travelling from other states, including Cam, who we'll hear from a little bit later.
 
This is a great day for the myeloma community, in large part because of the work that they have done with companies like J&J and clinical leaders like those who are here at Alfred. It's a terrific privilege to be a part of it.
 
I'm going to hand over now to Andrew to talk about some of the details of this wonderful new treatment.
 
PROFESSOR ANDREW SPENCER, ALFRED HOSPITAL HEAD OF THE MALIGNANT HAEMATOLOGY, TRANSPLANTATION AND CELLULAR THERAPIES SERVICE: This is a significant cancer that we deal with, and it's the second most common form of blood cancer and, with conventional therapy, it would be considered to be incurable. There’s very few cancers that fit into that bucket in the sense with therapy. Over the past, I guess, 5 to 10 years, there's been a paradigm shift really in the sort of class of therapeutics that are being explored in cancer, and the myeloma space has been unequivocal evidence immunotherapeutic approaches to treating myeloma are a game changer. Those therapies fall into those classified as monoclonal antibodies, and then there are cellular therapies to which Carvykti is a prime example.
 
The advantage of CAR-T or cellular therapies is this is a one-off treatment. Patients have their own cells extracted, they're genetically modified and re-infused into the patient where they target the tumour cell. This has huge implications for patients in that they're not on continuous therapy.
 
The evidence for the approval of Carvykti is based on what's called the CARTITUDE-1 trial undertaken by J&J, where patients who'd been afforded access to all other forms of therapy and relapsed yet again were treated with Carvykti. The evidence shows that approximately 30 per cent of those patients will be alive and disease-free more than five years after reinfusion. This is absolutely staggering in terms of the durability of response, as we've done work here in collaboration with other centres showing that the survival for these patients with conventional therapy is just a few months. It's an absolutely momentous improvement in outcome.
 
I think we have to thank the federal government and the Victorian Government for coming to the party here to make this available, both in Victoria and around the country. I think we need to acknowledge the perseverance of J&J Australia, who’ve worked for several years to get this across the line in negotiating with the government, and acknowledge the fact that we're only one of now 6 countries globally that have access to Carvykti. We're really ahead of the game here, and I think this is going to make a huge change to our patients. I think in the next few years, it's likely that this therapy will be made available earlier in the treatment algorithm for patients, and those benefits will be amplified. Thank you very much.
 
CAMERON JOHNSTON, PATIENT: It's quite sobering actually hearing the previous 2 speakers. I knew that I was lucky, I didn't realise just how lucky I was though. Five years it’s being spoken about. And I was diagnosed in 2021 Christmas Eve as being advanced-stage multiple myeloma and that I probably had to seriously look at palliative care. And the next 6 months that went on was a series of horrible chemotherapies, immunotherapies, stem-cell transplants, and nothing was slowing it, and my doctors were actually saying that they were quite worried. They’d never seen, it was a very aggressive form of cancer, and the reason I opened with that 5-year mark is that I’m coming up to 5 years.
 
And I stand before you thanks to everybody in these rooms, and these rooms as what they call stringent complete remission, which I think is pretty special. And it just goes to show that I can go from such a dire diagnosis to being cancer-free. They can’t find it in any of my body, any of my cells, and honestly, with the experience that I had leading up to here, and now the life that I have ahead, it gives me more than hope. It’s given me more than time, it’s given me a life back where I can really choose the life that I want to live. It’s very sobering.
 
And like I said, I’m extremely lucky because the life that I do live now, thanks to CAR-T, is one that I have longevity. I don’t have to try and pack all of this life now into a very short amount of time. I have the options to live a very good life. I just, the treatment that I was given was groundbreaking. And I think that if this can be given to other people, it goes so much more than just me as a patient. It affects the people around me, It affects the lives of people that are in my life. Unfortunately, personally, cancer is very, it shakes the tree. It’s very hard for people to stand beside a lot of people, so it does affect the whole family. But as hope has also been spoken about, having that hope is such a big part to healing, and it’s here in particular when nothing else was working.
 
I travelled to Melbourne, I live in Brisbane, but this, the Alfred Hospital and Andrew and the team was the only place that I could get this, and so for 4 years I’ve travelled down here. And unlike a lot of other things that I’ve tried, here was always full of hope. The people that were doing my treatments, the staff, the whole team were behind me. And that, unfortunately, is quite a rare commodity when it comes to cancer because a lot of people have got this idea that it is a death sentence. To come and be around people that are positive for me and then giving me solutions, it's just, gratitude isn't the word that covers it.
 
I'm here now. I have big plans for the rest of my life. It's been a big life, but to know that I have a big life ahead of me too is just incredible. Thank you, Minister, for making this possible for other people because just, as I said, that hope is half the battle and now we've got something that's proven to extend lives and give lives back. Thank you.
 
JEFF BROWNE, MYELOMA AUSTRALIA CHAIR: This lifts people up and gives them hope. Notwithstanding what you've heard, myeloma is a deadly disease, 27 per cent of people die within the first 18 months and the survival rate beyond 5 years is, as the Minister said, about 1 in 2. We've got to improve those outcomes, and this is the first step today in doing that with the approval of Carvykti. Over the last number of years, and many have been involved longer than I have, we've moved from this big chemo blast to immunotherapies where we get smarter and better at the way we treat various forms of cancer, including myeloma. And I want to thank the Minister, the government, Mark, you are, and you'll forgive me please for saying, but you are a minister with a big heart. And I thank you so much on behalf of the community.
 
To the Victorian Government, and J&J. The secret sauce in all of this is collaboration and bringing people together where we can get the best outcomes. We're an amazing country in Australia. As Andrew said, 1 in 6 around the world who have been able to secure this treatment, Carvykti, which gives great hope to every person with myeloma, 22,000 patients and their family and their friends and their circle. We're talking about hundreds of thousands of people.
 
A very important day for the community and I want to thank the government, thank J&J, Andrew for your work and research and what's led us to this day. Cam, to come along and light us up with your big smile and let us know why we're all here. Thank you very much.
 
JOANA DE CASTRO, JOHNSON & JOHNSON INNOVATIVE MEDICINE ANZ TEAM LEAD: Innovative medicine is never easy, and Carvykti has definitely been no exception. Johnson & Johnson has worked tirelessly to get us to where we are here today, considering that Australia has one of the highest mortality rates for multiple myeloma, but more importantly, that for patients like Cam, Carvykti is nothing short of a lifeline. At Johnson & Johnson, we're incredibly grateful for the collaboration with the government and the myeloma community. Clinicians, patients, advocates, and the government have all come together throughout the years to get us to this point. And I want to say, without the collaboration, this was not impossible.
 
Carvykti is an investment in Australia's future. A healthy society is a productive society. And we are incredibly grateful for the government to recognise the value of Carvykti as a life-changing treatment for multiple myeloma. But I have to say, our work at Johnson & Johnson is far from over. Today is a big step towards our mission of eliminating cancer. But we will continue working tirelessly with the myeloma community and the government to continue to make a difference for patients like Cam, so they have a chance at having more time to invest in the things that truly matter in life. With this, I want to thank everyone. It’s such a special day, and welcome for our morning team.
 
JOURNALIST: So, Minister, first of all, just how significant is this in the battle against myeloma?
 
BUTLER: This is the first CAR-T cell therapy funded by governments, 1 of only 6 countries in the world, first in the Asia Pacific. And it's going to give new hope for hundreds of myeloma patients every single year. We've really seen a real spate of new treatments after 12 years of nothing being funded in this area. This will be the third new treatment in just 6 months.
 
JOURNALIST: You mentioned people who have been at you for a while, including someone who's obviously very close to Channel 7, Sandy Roberts. Just how important has that advocacy, that very public advocacy been?
 
BUTLER: I said the advocacy by Myeloma Australia and some of those key ambassadors like Sandy Roberts and Jeff Browne who joined us here today has really lifted up the community consciousness of this condition but also the awareness among governments of the need to really find new ways to bring new treatments to market.
 
JOURNALIST: And has that made your job easier? Because I would imagine you're continually seeing these therapies, and you're continually going to Cabinet and it's always a battle for the big dollars. So having that sort of advocacy being so public, does that help you in your job when you have to go and try and get them made?
 
BUTLER: Absolutely. These funding decisions at the end of the day are made on merit. There is a very strong case pressed by J&J for this particular CAR-T cell therapy, for example. What I've seen over the last few years, and I'm sure we're seeing this at state government level as well, is more and more colleagues coming to me and saying, what are we doing for myeloma patients in Australia, 12 years without new treatments is just far too long.
 
JOURNALIST: Do you have estimate of how many people will benefit from this and how much it would have cost for them to get this treatment without the government aid?
 
BUTLER: Without government funding, this treatment would cost about $200,000 for individual patients, obviously well beyond the means of most Australians. And we think there'll be several hundred Australians who'll be able to access this free of charge through their local state public hospitals.
 
JOURNALIST: And Jeff Browne made it very clear that this is just the start. So what do you expect to happen? And can you expect Myeloma Australia knocking at your door saying, let's do some more?
 
BUTLER: I don't think they're finished by any stretch of the imagination. A couple of new immunotherapies on the PBS has been a game changer, but this new cell therapy, the first we have in this area, is really sort of breaking the mould, and I think presenting great new opportunities for cancer treatment, including myeloma treatment in the future.
 
JOURNALIST: Sorry, Minister, before you go, I've just got a question from our friends at Canberra. If you don't mind, I'm just going to read my phone. What are your concerns around Philip Morris giving evidence at a parliamentary inquiry where the evidence was in camera?
 
BUTLER: I've reminded my parliamentary colleagues in the Senate, in the House, across all political parties about the obligations that they have as public officials under the international conventions around tobacco control. That obligation includes not engaging with officials and employees of Big Tobacco and I am a little concerned, although I’ve still got to get the full details, I am a little concerned about these reports that I've heard. I only reminded my colleagues in recent days about those obligations that we all have as public officials, and again I urge colleagues to abide by those obligations.
 
JOURNALIST: Just a quick follow up, should they have given the evidence publicly?
 
BUTLER: Of course, we think particularly if industry is giving evidence about ways in which public decisions will impact their profits that they should be answerable for that evidence.