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When the agent at the check-in counter at Montréal-Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport told Florence Corleto that she needed a note from a doctor clearing her to fly — she was 34 weeks pregnant and heading home to El Salvador in early July after a two-week work assignment — he couldn’t have known that his decision would probably save the life of Corleto’s baby.

Baby Florence Corleto was born in Montreal that month with a rare inherited disorder known as maple syrup urine disease. It’s caused by an inability to break down certain amino acids — leucine, isoleucine and valine — so that they build up in the body. Infants seem healthy at birth but they deteriorate quickly if untreated and often suffer irreversible brain damage. Severe cases result in death.

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Had Florencita (as she is known) been born in El Salvador, it is unlikely the condition would have been recognized, let alone managed. But through circumstance and fate, she was born in Montreal, where a team of experts and specialists at the Montreal Children’s Hospital of the McGill University Health Centre knew precisely what to do.