8月3日，脑死亡妇女苏珊·托里斯产下女儿小苏珊后死亡；9月12日，即在小苏珊刚刚满月后也不幸夭折。

    据美联社9月13日报道，女婴的家人指出，小苏珊的病情在这个周末逐渐恶化。早产导致她肠道功能紊乱并身体受到感染。11日凌晨，在医院对她进行治疗肠穿孔的紧急手术后终因心力衰竭死亡。

    26岁的苏珊是美国国家卫生研究院的研究员。她不幸患上了最致命的皮肤癌———恶性黑素瘤。今年5月7日，癌细胞急剧扩散至脑部导致她昏迷不醒，苏珊被医生宣布脑死亡。当时，她已怀孕15个星期。为拯救小生命，苏珊近3个月来一直是依靠生命支持系统维持生命。

    8月2日，苏珊通过剖腹产手术顺利将孕育了近26周的女儿苏珊·安妮·凯瑟琳·托里斯带到人世。苏珊在分娩过程中没有出现任何并发症。小苏珊出生后在美国阿灵顿弗吉尼亚医疗中心的新生儿特护部门接受监护，并被医护人员形容为“精力非常旺盛”。 3日，在苏珊家人的同意下医院停止了一切救治措施。苏珊因此在女儿出生后的第2天就离开了人世。

    在这场让胎儿在体内发育和苏珊体内癌细胞扩散的比赛中，医生和苏珊家人一直以来付出了艰辛的努力。曾是印刷品推销员的丈夫贾森不得不辞去工作照顾妻子，每天睡在妻子床边的一个躺椅上。苏珊两岁的儿子被送到爷爷奶奶家照看。

    据美国康涅狄格健康中心大学介绍，自1979年以来，已有11宗脑死亡妇女为生育胎儿而延长生命的例子。

    An infant born last month to a severely brain-damaged woman died Monday after emergency surgery to repair a perforated intestine.

    Susan Anne Catherine Torres, born prematurely on Aug. 2 after her mother was on life support for three months, died of heart failure at Children's National Medical Center in Washington, a family statement said.

    The infant's condition had deteriorated rapidly during the weekend, according to the family. The baby's prematurity led to an intestinal disorder and an infection that overwhelmed her body, and she died just after midnight, the hospital said.

    Cancer patient Susan Rollin Torres, a 26-year-old researcher at the National Institutes of Health, suffered a stroke in May after melanoma spread to her brain. She was kept alive on life support so she could deliver the child.

    A spokeswoman at St. Rita's Church in Alexandria said parishioners were told of the child's death during the morning Mass.

    "After the efforts of this summer to bring her into the world, this is obviously a devastating loss for the Torres and Rollin families," Justin Torres, the woman's brother-in-law, said in the e-mailed statement. "We wish to thank all the people who sustained us in prayer over the past 17 weeks. It was our fondest wish that we could have been able to share Susan's homecoming with the world."

    The baby's father, Jason Torres, had made the decision after his wife lost consciousness to keep her on life support for the sake of her fetus.

    The pregnancy became a race between the fetus' development and the cancer that was ravaging the woman's body. Doctors at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington, where the baby was born, had said at the time that Torres' health was deteriorating and that the risk of harm to the fetus finally outweighed the benefits of extending the pregnancy.

    The mother died shortly after her daughter's birth when she was taken off life support. The baby was about two months premature and weighed 1 pound, 13 ounces.

    After her birth, doctors said they saw no signs that her mother's cancer had crossed the placenta, and they described her as feisty and vigorous. In late August, the family said Susan had passed the 2-pound mark and had been taken off a ventilator, though she remained in neonatal intensive care.

    English-language medical literature contains at least 11 cases since 1979 of irreversibly brain-damaged women whose lives were prolonged for the benefit of the developing fetus, according to the University of Connecticut Health Center.