Baby Who Donated Marrow to Sister Meets the Press

In the glare of television lights Thursday, 14-month-old Marissa Eve Ayala flirtatiously lifted her blue-and-white dress for the film crews and newspaper photographers.

The dark-eyed girl had turned the pack of cynics into cooing fans.

Barely able to say “Daddy,” Marissa was oblivious to the reason she was in front of a roomful of news people at the City of Hope National Medical Center in Duarte. She danced on top of a table, almost stepping on a dozen microphones.

But Marissa’s parents, Abe and Mary Ayala of Walnut, brought her to the press conference for a reason: to show the world that their baby is OK.

On Tuesday, doctors at the City of Hope had inserted a thick needle into Marissa’s hipbone, extracted some of her bone marrow and transplanted it into her sister, 19-year-old Anissa, who suffers from chronic myelogenous leukemia.

The Ayalas had conceived Marissa two years ago--after failing to find a donor whose marrow type matched Anissa’s--in the hope the new baby could be a donor. Some medical ethicists have criticized the idea of conceiving one child to save another.

Dr. Stephen Forman, a transplant specialist caring for Anissa, said she will be hospitalized for at least two months. It will take two years, he said, to be certain whether she is rid of the cancer.

Anissa’s parents said their older daughter, who is engaged, is in high spirits. “She’s dreaming of the dress she will wear when she marries Bryan Espinosa,” Mary Ayala said. “Anissa will appreciate life a lot more now.”