Six-year-old Arya Pathak, a resident of Abu Dhabi, is suffering from spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), a life-threatening genetic disease that keeps her in a wheelchair.br SMA affects the motor neurons, or the nerve cells in the spinal cord that controls muscle movement. A viral infection like common cold could lead to breathing problems and an abnormally high heart rate that would immediately land Arya in the intensive care unit.