Young Finley Hill finally met the man who saved his life in an emotional moment on This Morning.
The 10-year-old boy – who had been suffering from a rare condition called familial haemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (HLH), where the body reacts inappropriately to a ‘trigger’ – needed a rare stem cell transplant, and in 2019 he found a match with a bone marrow donor named Jose from Brazil.
Finley appeared on the ITV daytime show alongside his parents Jo and Paul as he reflected on the way his life has changed over the past few years.
The youngster has a passion for theatre and recently appeared in a production of High School Musical, and he admitted he owes everything to Jose.
He smiled: ‘The world. I just would not be here. I’d be [dead]!’
Finley’s family and Jose have sent messages back and forth over the years, although there have been some language barriers as his English and their Portuguese aren’t too strong – although the boy did learn some to make things easier.
‘We’ve only exchanged WhatsApp messages. We don’t speak the same language. Finn did learn a little bit of Portuguese and send him a little video,’ Jo said, before This Morning host Phillip Schofield introduced a video message sent in by Jose.
Then, he revealed: ‘The thing is, we’ve gone one step further than that. We’ve flown him from Brazil and he’s about to come in through those doors there. Here’s the man himself.’
Finley and his parents were absolutely stunned and broke down in tears of joy as Jose walked through the doors and they were able to meet him for the first time.
They shared a tight embrace in the studio and made their way to the sofa where Jose, speaking through a translator, opened up on his side of the incredible story, having worked in a hospital for 27 years.
‘I work at a hospital that treats children with cancer, and doing one of the large campaigns to get donors to donate bone barrow. I was just walking with my family and we saw a poster in the shopping mall,’ the dad-of-two explained.
His daughter encouraged him to donate, and 12 years later there was a match that saved Finley’s life.
Asked how he felt finally meeting the boy for the first time, Jose said: ‘A lot of emotions going through.’
‘I don’t think Jose even realises what he’s done,’ Jo cried, while he replied: ‘I do understand because I also have children and if one of my [children] needed that gesture, I would love someone to do this for them.’
And Finley beamed, saying he was ‘very happy’ to meet then man who saved his life.
This Morning airs weekdays at 10am on ITV.
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