
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, April 12, 1990                   TAG: 9004120638
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-14   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

MARROW DONOR/ CREATING LIFE TO SAVE ANOTHER

THE SUGGESTION that a couple would conceive a baby for bone marrow to save an older child's life sounds cold and calculating. But look at the picture accompanying a news story about the infant's birth, and you see that the California family who took the step had a beautiful idea.

Marissa Eve Ayala is a healthy baby who weighed 6 pounds, 4 ounces when she was born last week at a suburban Los Angeles hospital. It won't be determined for months whether she'll be able to save the life of her sister, who suffers from leukemia. But the fact the baby is alive herself is a miracle.

Abe and Mary Ayala faced formidable obstacles when they decided to have another baby. For one thing, Abe Ayala was sterile: He had had a vasectomy 16 years previously. Only about half the operations to reverse vasectomies are successful, but Ayala's was. For another, the Ayalas are in their mid-40s, and the likelihood of pregnancy is reduced in older women. Mary Ayala had a 73 percent chance of being able to conceive.

The couple's decision to try to create a bone-marrow donor for their 18-year-old daughter, Anissa, was a last resort. For about two years, the family had tried without success to find compatible marrow for the teen-ager.

The odds of finding a bone-marrow donor for Anissa were about one in 20,000 among the general population. There was only a 25 percent chance that the baby's marrow would be suitable, but again Marissa Eve beat the statistics. Fetal tests showed she could qualify as a donor.

The drawback is that while a marrow transplant is Anissa's only hope, it may not work. With the marrow donation, she is given a 70 percent to 80 percent chance of recovery.

The plan to create one child to save another was distasteful to many people, and the Ayalas have been criticized severely. But children are brought into the world for reasons far less noble than that. A great number get here by accident. Marissa Eve's birth was planned, and the child is very much wanted by her family. The Ayalas had said they would love the baby whether or not she could help their older daughter.

When she's old enough to understand the reason for her birth, will Marissa Eve feel unwanted for herself? In fact, she might realize that her place in the family is very special. Her middle name, Eve, means life.

by CNB