Jim and Jill Kelly have devoted their lives to saving others from the pain of losing a child. Their work paid off

This was 2:28 Tuesday afternoon. Jill and her older daughter, Erin Kelly-Bean, had just finished recording the mid-February edition of their podcast, “Light Your Heart With Hope.” The episode coincided with the birthday of their husband and dad, legendary Buffalo Bills quarterback Jim Kelly, and their son and brother, Hunter, who like his father, was born on Valentine’s Day.

Hunter died nearly 20 years ago, at age 8, and was vividly on the minds of Jill, Erin and the Kellys’ younger daughter, Camryn, who was home from college that day and accompanied her mom and sister to the recording. The podcast episode marked what would have been his 27th birthday, if Krabbe disease had not taken him.

Now sitting in the car, Jill allowed the message on her phone to sink in. The text had come from her mother, Jacque Waggoner, who added a trio of praise-hand emojis, as if to say, Thank God, our prayers have been answered.

Jill absorbed the message. She thought about her two grown daughters, who were here with her today. She thought about Hunter, who never had that chance. She must have thought about Jim, her Hall of Famer husband, who lost the son he always wanted, and whose own health battles have been fought publicly over the last decade, and outmatched in intensity only by the Kelly family’s fight for kids like Hunter.

Those kids. Those babies. Those families who find out, as the Kellys did in 1997, that their child has the rare disorder called Krabbe disease, which impairs the brain’s ability to send signals to the rest of the body. For Hunter, Krabbe disease was fatal. But for children now, it doesn’t need to be.

Because of this 10-to-3 vote by a panel of doctors on a federal advisory committee, Krabbe disease is now going to be added to a national list of recommended newborn screening tests. That means children today who have Krabbe disease will…