UAE doctor who went viral for brave stance during Covid returns after 20 years

An Emirati oncologist who went viral in 2020 for deciding to stay in the US to treat Covid patients and not leave has returned to his homeland after 20 years of living abroad. And he has two key missions: Reduce the cost of one of the most expensive and remove misconceptions around the scary “C word.”

The first thing Dr Ajlan Al Zaki noticed in his patients in the UAE was an instilled fear of cancer. “It's okay to say the C word. A lot of patients come in and they hear the word cancer and that brings in fear. There are concerns, and understandably so. They just want to make sure that they're okay. That sort of awareness needs to be spread out where cancer is not necessarily a bad word,” he told Khaleej Times.

Another thing he noticed was how his patients in the country take everything at face value. “We tend to use "Dr Google" or AI,” Al Zaki said. “I remind my patients that they can Google a little bit, but don't believe everything they read online.”

, a triple board-certified haematologist and oncologist previously based out of the US, went viral during the beginning of the Covid pandemic in 2020 after the UAE government called on its citizens abroad to return home, but he decided not to leave and to stay in order to perform his duty as a doctor and treat infected patients.

Currently, he is director of Burjeel Haematology Oncology and Cellular Therapy Centre and a specialist in CAR-T cell and Advanced immunotherapies. “The UAE has supported me during this whole time. I was going through my personal journey of developing experience and getting that experience where I felt like I would be comfortable enough to bring everything back,” Al Zaki said.

More affordable CAR-T cell therapy

Today, the haematologist-oncologist is continuing his path of helping cancer patients by reducing the costs of one of the most personalised and expensive cancer treatments–chimeric antigen receptor . This type of treatment involves genetically engineering a patient’s T-cells and training them to recognise a specific marker on a cancer cell and then fighting those off once given back to the patient. Because this treatment is so personalised, the costs of treatment are significantly higher. One single infusion could cost a whopping $1 million.

During the first day of the Abu Dhabi Global Health Week event, which ran from April15-17, Burjeel Holdings announced its partnership with Caring Cross, a US-based non-profit, to reduce the costs of CAR T cell therapy treatment by up to 90 per cent compared to international costs. “It could be up to 90 per cent, where that bar is going to be in the UAE, we don't know. But I know for sure that we can provide it at a lower cost than what's commercially approved,” Al Zaki said.

Dr Al Zaki. Photo: Supplied

Al Zaki explained that the reason why costs may be reduced by that much is due to the technology offered by Caring Cross to locally manufacture the cells. “When you're programming the CAR-T cells, think of it as downloading software on your iPhone. So, you have your iPhone, which is your T cells. If you want to upgrade your iPhone, you have to download software,” he said.

Al Zaki continued: “It's the software sometimes which can be really expensive. And so, what Caring Cross does is they make the software, and they provide it at a significantly reduced cost. And we use that software to then upgrade the T cells.”

“I want people to have access to these kinds of therapies anywhere in the world. That's why we went into medicine,” he said.

From engineering to medicine

After starting his academic journey as a , Al Zaki met a professor who suggested that he should try to do some research. At the time, Al Zaki had plans to work for one of the oil companies in the UAE.

However, that eye-opening conversation prompted him to switch course and turn to research as a career path. “The idea of cancer always intrigued me at that time. How do we diagnose it? How do we treat it? What are new ways that we are using to prevent it from occurring in the beginning?” he said.

Six years and a PhD in research later, Al Zaki decided that medicine was his true calling and pursued medical school.

In 2012, when his grandfather was diagnosed with , Al Zaki grew inspired to help people when they are at their worst, whether it be medical or emotional support.

He said that despite the condition his grandfather was in, he knew how important it was to just be present. “I read once that sometimes the best therapy that you can give to a patient that's not administered by way of mouth or way of the vein, is really through the way of the ear. Sometimes [words of comfort are] the strongest therapy you can give to someone.”