A motorcycle rider with American flag fluttering passes crowds during the 32nd Annual, and possibly final, Rolling Thunder "Ride for Freedom" during Memorial Day weekend to support veterans and call attention to POWs and MIAs, in Washington, U.S., May 26, 2019. REUTERS/Mike TheilerRolling Thunder organizers contradict Trump's tweet

Army soldiers who were part of the last American combat units to exit Iraq in 2011 arrive in Fort Hood, Tex.Army tweet prompts stories of effects of military service

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A mother in Iowa is sharing powerful footage of her 1-year-old daughter, who had been declared brain dead after contracting a virus, getting wheeled into organ donation surgery in an effort to stress the importance of the gift of life.

Last month, Coralynn “Cora” Sobolik’s final moments were spent being honored by her parents Meagan and Paul Sobolik, as well as the medical staff at Mayo Clinic Hospital in Rochester.

In the emotional video shared on YouTube, nurses and doctors lined the hospital hallways and sang “Amazing Grace” as Cora was pushed toward the surgical unit, with her parents by her side.

“The staff at Mayo was more than any family could ask for,” Meagan tells PEOPLE of the heartbreaking moment. “I was speechless, and it was truly wonderful to see and feel so much love and support for our little girl.”

Just one day earlier, doctors had declared the 1-year-old to be brain dead after a five-day battle with parainfluenza complications.

Meagan and Paul first brought their baby girl to the hospital at Cresco Medical on Friday, April 19, where Cora showed signs that she was having difficulty breathing, according to the GoFundMe page created by Cora’s aunt Melissa Brevig.

Because of her condition, Brevig said doctors decided to transfer Cora to Mayo Clinic Hospital in Rochester, but in order to do so successfully, they needed to sedate and intubate her.

It was during that procedure that Cora’s heart stopped, prompting the medical staff to perform CPR on the baby for nearly 25 minutes, while Meagan, Paul and Cora’s grandma watched on.

After finally stabilizing her, Cora was transferred to Mayo Clinic Hospital and had arrived by 4 p.m. on Friday.

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Cora Sobolik | Courtesy Meagan Sobolik

The first update from doctors said that Cora’s heart and echocardiogram were performing well. But things quickly took a turn for the worst when doctors took Cora for a CAT scan and discovered she had brain damage.

Though they were all optimistic that the little girl might wake up — knowing that she would have a “different life” than before — things progressively got worse and Cora’s brain started to swell.

In a moment that no parent should have to experience, Meagan and Paul were told that their daughter was brain dead at 4:45 p.m. on Sunday, April 21.

“I dropped to my knees and cried and kept saying, ‘No, no, no, God, no,'” Meagan recalls. “I then felt numb and felt empty.”

After processing the loss, the couple decided to do something that would ensure that Cora’s legacy would live on forever: donate her organs to people who desperately needed them.

“When we knew that she wasn’t ever going to wake and that she was gone mentally, we knew that she would want her organs to help people in need,” Meagan explains, noting that she decided to record the moment Cora went into organ donation surgery for their loved ones who could not be there.

The emotional video, which was recorded by Mayo Clinic Hospital’s chaplain, was eventually shared on social media, where it went on to touch millions of people around the world.

Though it has been difficult to rewatch, Meagan says every time she and Paul do, they know Cora “is watching it with us in spirit” and it reminds them of the “amazing” hospital staff who went out of their way to say a proper goodbye to their baby.

“The doctor that took care of her came in on his day off to the be the first in line and also the last one to be with us when they shut the elevator doors to take her to surgery,” Meagan explains. “The nursing staff was amazing to us … They gave us so much comfort and support while we were there, it was amazing.”

“It also adds comfort to me to see [Cora] again and confirm what we did was the right thing to do,” Meagan adds of rewatching the video.

Cora, too, has since touched millions of lives with her story, especially three in particular — a 1-year-old boy who received her heart, a 1-year-old girl who received her liver and a 41-year-old woman who received her kidneys.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/missing-persons-missing-children-reports-drop-to-lowest-in-decades_2934122.html

May 23, 2019 Updated: May 23, 2019 Share

The reports of missing persons, and missing children in particular, decreased in 2018, reaching levels unseen since the beginning of available FBI data.

Nearly 613,000 Americans were reported missing in 2018, more than 424,000 of them under the age of 18. That’s a drop of almost 6 and 9 percent respectively from the year prior and the lowest shown in available records going as far back as 1990.

The numbers had dropped precipitously from the high of more than 980,000 reported missing in 1997 to less than 628,000 in 2013, but then started to pick up again—until the drop in 2018.

It’s not clear what exactly is behind the latest decrease.

Part of the long-term downward trend may have to do with technology, said Robert Lowery, vice president for the missing children division at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

Most of the missing children are runaways between 13 and 17, he said in a phone interview. “A lot of these children now have, frankly, cellphones or smartphones. They’re also using social media. … The point being that parents are able to find their children themselves much quicker than they had been, before they have to engage law enforcement.”

Law enforcement techniques to locate missing children have also improved, he said.

But that doesn’t quite explain the sudden drop in 2018. Smartphones and social media have been popular among youth for more than a decade and there seems to be no indication that law enforcement techniques made a sudden advance in 2018.

“It may have been an anomaly,” Lowery said. “We’re going to continue to watch the trend.”

Link to Trafficking

While most missing persons are found, runaway children are vulnerable to exploitation, particularly sex trafficking.

“Traffickers, as well as buyers, strategically prey upon runaway children because of their mental, physical, and financial vulnerability,” according to the 2009 National Report on Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking: America’s Prostituted Children (pdf).

“The stark reality is that the supply is never-ending … I mean, that little girl who started as a runaway on the streets in Washington state and ended up on the streets of Miami Beach as a prostitute is way too typical,” said Andrew Oosterbaan, then-chief of the Justice Department’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, according to the report. “There is an endless supply—and it is almost surreal to have these words leave my mouth—endless supply of victims. But that’s the stark reality.”

“The victims view running away as a way to escape an environment that they cannot control,” the report said. “It is not a coincidence that the average age of a runaway falls squarely within the age range a child is recruited into prostitution, as the victimized child who flees from home often lands straight in the welcoming arms of a trafficker posing as protector and caretaker.”

The most at-risk group are runaways from the social services system, such as foster care, group homes, or government facilities, Lowery said.

Trump Cracks Down

President Donald Trump has put a major emphasis on fighting human trafficking during the past two years. In February 2018, he signed an executive order to dismantle transnational criminal organizations that traffic and exploit people.

In April 2018, Trump signed into law the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act and Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act, or SESTA-FOSTA, that stopped the shielding of website operators from state criminal charges or civil liability if they facilitate sex ads or prostitution. Just days later, sex-trafficking website Backpage.com was taken down by the FBI.

Subsequently, the demand for online sex trafficking has dropped as the operators of smaller sites struggle to stay afloat, according to a report by a counter-human trafficking technology company.

On Dec. 31, 2018, Trump proclaimed January 2019 as “National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month”—after issuing a similar declaration for January 2018.