'It's time to bite the bullet and move on from our proton therapy fiasco.'
Australia was promised world-class proton beam therapy nearly a decade ago.
A life-saving technology that precisely targets cancer cells while sparing healthy tissue.
Yet at the end of 2025, families are still boarding planes to the United States, sick children in tow, to access treatment that should already be available here.
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What began as a vision for the future of cancer care at Adelaide's South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI) has instead become one of the most expensive medical procurement failures in recent memory.
"More than $100 million of taxpayer dollars have been poured into a deal that simply didn't deliver."
When I asked Health Minister Mark Butler today whether it was time to "bite the bullet" and concede the South Australian project had failed, he didn't deny the frustration.
"It's a matter of enormous frustration and regret that we've had this experience in South Australia," he said.
"We can't change that fact. We've now got to find something in the future."
Butler said the government is "working closely" with South Australia to see if "an alternative pathway" can be salvaged.
But the reality is this: the Minister said the company contracted years ago was "simply incapable" of delivering the technology and the purpose-built centre is no longer needed.
Senior sources have told me behind the scenes the contract should never have been given to SAHMRI in the first place, and should have been operated out of a major hospital.
After years of delays, excuses, and wasted millions, Australia still has no operational proton beam therapy facility.
The question now is not whether to fix what's broken -- it's whether to start again somewhere else.
For Kate and Daniel Fraser, the cost isn't financial, it's emotional, physical, and devastating.
Their four-year-old daughter Charlie has a rare brain tumour, one of only four cases in Australia in the past 15 years.
After two major surgeries and the start of intense rounds of chemotherapy, her doctors at the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne told them she needs proton therapy to save her life.
"Our next step is to go over to America, Florida," Daniel Fraser said.
The Frasers are packing up their lives leaving behind their support networks, to relocate halfway around the world.
It's their only option.
Daniel said of his beautiful girl: "She's got her mum's determination and dad's grit, she'll come through."
Mum Kate acknowledged: "She's got a really hard, long battle ahead. But we're sort of holding on to the positivity and to the hope and loving our girl as much as we can and hope that she can fight it herself because we can't do it for her."
"You don't have to be in our position, with our heartbreak, to walk through that ward and be devastated to see what you see up there. Australia has amazing medical staff, they need to be able to give the therapy here," she added.
The family have started a GoFundMe to help them fund the therapy.
Associate Professor Dion Forstner, a radiation oncologist and former president of the Clinical Oncology Society of Australia, didn't mince words.
"Proton beam radiotherapy is a fundamental part of childhood cancer treatment," he told me at Adelaide Airport.
"It's unacceptable that we're still sending children overseas."
Forstner said that while traditional radiation machines do a good job, proton therapy can drastically reduce long-term side effects in children, protecting growing bones and developing organs.
"We've been watching this for the last ten years," he said.
"Unfortunately, the approach taken wasn't coordinated nationally. It didn't engage key stakeholders and that's why we've ended up here."
He believes Australia needs to move forward with a new facility "preferably close to a major children's hospital" and one from a reliable international vendor.
While Minister Butler is still "considering all options," one clear alternative has already emerged: the Peter MacCallum Centre in Melbourne.
A world-class cancer centre.
It has the expertise, the infrastructure, and crucially the proximity to the Royal Children's Hospital.
The proposal is ready to go and while it hasn't been confirmed, I have been told the centre is seeking just $10 million of government funding.
A fraction of what has already been spent on the project and sending children overseas.
South Australia's Bragg Building has become a monument to failure.
An empty shell of what was meant to be a beacon of innovation.
"I want to deliver this capability as soon as possible," Butler said.
"I hear the frustration of clinicians very loudly. I hear the frustration of families as well."
Every month that passes without action means more families like the Frasers are forced to fly across the world for treatment enduring financial strain, emotional trauma, and time away from their loved ones.
It's time for the federal and state governments to stop trying to resuscitate a failed deal and to deliver on the promise of proton therapy in Melbourne, not someday, but now.