In a First, Surgeons Attached a Pig Kidney to a Human — and It Worked

Zeedox

Resident Canadian
Dec 1, 2020
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Canada's Ocean Playground

Surgeons in New York have successfully attached a kidney grown in a genetically altered pig to a human patient and found that the organ worked normally, a scientific breakthrough that one day may yield a vast new supply of organs for severely ill patients.

Although many questions remain to be answered about the long-term consequences of the transplant, which involved a brain-dead patient followed only for 54 hours, experts in the field said the procedure represented a milestone.

“We need to know more about the longevity of the organ,” said Dr. Dorry Segev, professor of transplant surgery at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine who was not involved in the research. Nevertheless, he said: “This is a huge breakthrough. It’s a big, big deal.”
 
I know they've been working on this for a while and have been using pig heart valves and the like in humans, but an entire organ?! That is unbelievable.

Man, if that holds water it's a complete game changer for renal science. And as a man on one kidney thanks to cancer, that's good news!
 
What's interesting is this is one of the plot points in the book trilogy Oryx and Crake, The Year of the Flood, and MaddAddam by Canadian author Margaret Atwood (The Handmaid's Tales author).
 
Damn. That's quite something. I knew they practiced shit on pigs becuase their skin and muscles resemble ours but damn. We can actually use them? That's out there.