Effort To Save 4-Yr.-Old's Life With Cell Donor Starts In Bayside

BAYSIDE, QUEENS — A blood and marrow stem cell donation drive in Bayside on Monday kicked off an effort to save a four-year-old’s life.

Ayden Paredes was diagnosed with leukemia in February, and to treat the disease he will need a stem cell or bone marrow transplant, which requires blood or tissue donations that match his own — a challenge amid the COVID-induced nationwide blood shortage, which is made even harder by Paredes’ ethnic background.

“Unfortunately [in] Hispanic populations, Black populations, Asian populations, Middle Eastern populations, there’s just not enough matches,” Barble Paredes, Ayden’s mom, told NY1. The four-year-old’s Colombian, Puerto Rican and Guatemalan heritage is underrepresented in donor registries — a common challenge for non-white patients, according to experts.

Of the roughly 22 million people who are registered donors, about 79 percent are of European or Caucasian background, Jair Thompson of Be The Match Registry, a donor nonprofit, told NY1.

“For a Hispanic patient, [Paredes’] chance of finding a match is only 48%,” Dr. Ron Jacob from Be The Match told CBS New York.

So far, the four-year-old hasn’t matched with any family members or people on the registry.

Be The Match and the New York City Blood Center, however, are hoping to change that with a series of eight blood and marrow stem cell donation drives across the tri-state area, starting in Bayside.

His parents hope that finding a match will help their son live a more normal, healthy life.

“He just wants to be that normal kid that can run without getting exhausted,” Mark Paredes, Ayden’s father and an NYPD officer told NY1. “Just to be a four-year-old.”

The donor drive for Paredes comes days before an annual blood drive in Bayside, that a local political stressed is "urgently needed."

In order to donate and see if you are a match, anyone between the ages of 18 to 44 can text ‘Ayden’ to 61474. All that is required for testing is a cheek swab.