When you hear Jackie Chan’s name, it’s usually in reference to his long awe-inspiring career as an entertainer and martial arts hero. But the cultural icon has always taken his status as a role model for kids seriously, and now, he’s taking that even further by helping to save the life of an 8-year-old girl with leukemia.
In the two years since Natalie Nakatani was diagnosed with leukemia, she has had to withstand five rounds of chemotherapy in her home town of San Francisco. The grueling treatments kept her cancer at bay, but now her doctors say a bone marrow transplant within the next few weeks is her only hope for survival. As is the case 70 percent of the time, Natalie’s parents and younger brother are not a match.
When Chan heard about Natalie’s situation, he jumped at the chance to film a public service announcement pleading for someone to come forward to help her find a match. The PSA asks potential donors to register with DKMS, the world’s largest bone marrow donor center.
In general, bone marrow donors are found within one’s ethnic group, but Asian Americans only amount to 7 percent of the 15.5 million donors in the US registry and none of them is a match for Natalie. In fact, she faces really tough odds because of her mixed racial heritage: Japanese, Chinese and Vietnamese. Remarkably, she does not match any of the 13 million bone marrow donors registered worldwide, which is why Chan’s PSA is such an important move in getting the word out to those who have never registered.
If you would like to donate your bone marrow, log on to DKMS and use code NNC-002 to order a rush test to be sent to you by mail.
You can watch Chan’s PSA below, followed by a video Natalie’s 5-year-old brother, Sean, made urging people to help.
Hope For Natalie Nakatani from Patrick Biesemans on Vimeo.
Photo courtesy of DKMS.