David and Tanya Melancon are married for three years. David is a pharmacist while Tanya is an account manager. While planning to invest on an insurance health policy that can change someone’s life, they decided to store their son’s cord blood before he was even conceived.
Zachary was born on December 15, 2011 and he could be diabetic when he’ll grow up. David and Tanya admitted that both of their families have history of diabetes and their only way of protecting their son from this lifetime disease is by storing his own cord blood in a private bank, in which they need to pay $7000 for twenty-five years.
“Hopefully, we never have to use it, but if we do …,” David said. “If we need it, you can’t put a price tag on it.”
Dr. Michelle Hughes is an obstetrician/gynecologist in Charlton Memorial Hospital, who delivered Zachary. She highly praised the couple’s decision for following what the medical breakthrough wants every couple to do. Stem cells in a cord blood contains a good amount of stem cells and it cures range of deadly diseases such as diabetes, Parkinson’s, leukemia, cerebral palsy and other serious illnesses.