The Human Connection

ROY OF HOPE

Coming from an illustrious family of doctors and philanthropists from Goa, Roy de Souza (53) was leading a dream life, both on the professional and personal fronts with his wife (Aisha de Sequeira) and their three sons. But just when all seems fine, nature has its way of throwing a nasty surprise. In 2017, Aisha was diagnosed with advanced-stage metastatic colon cancer. She passed away in 2020.

The loss of a dear one is never easy, but Roy converted his personal crisis into a battle against cancer. “Aisha was a wonderful and caring person. She had a lot of trust in me but I felt helpless at that time,” says Roy, an engineer and former digital advertising tech company founder, who has dedicated his life to vaccine research and developing a personalized vaccine for cancer. “It slowly dawned on me that nothing was working. But there should be some drugs that fight or cure cancer. I started talking to doctors and researchers but nobody had a clear answer,” Roy recollects. He has been honoured by the American Cancer Society for his endeavours in the fight against cancer.

Roy co-founded a medical technology company BreakBio that develops personalized vaccines and AI software that helps cancer treatments by identifying the difference between normal healthy cells and cancer cells. “Cancer is a very different disease. The way to treat it is to have different approaches for different persons. We have got a go-ahead from the FDA to do a human trial. It will be done in the US and I am optimistic about the results,” says Roy.

After his personal traumatic experience, Roy now ensures that other cancer patients and their families do not have to go through what he went through. “People feel they did not try enough. For some people, it is too complex an issue to handle. Hence, my advice is to connect with others and don’t be shy to do what you want to save your loved ones,” he says.