A 62-year-old man has successfully recovered from a groundbreaking operation where he received a genetically modified pig kidney transplant, the first of its kind in the world. The surgery took place on March 16 at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, United States and lasted four hours. According to a hospital bulletin, the man is recovering well from the operation, marking a historic milestone in the field of medicine where organs or tissues are transplanted between species.
The successful operation opens up possibilities for addressing the global shortage of organs, as transplanting organs from animals to humans could provide a solution. The man had previously received a human kidney transplant in 2018 at the same hospital but it stopped functioning five years later. He made the decision to try this new transplant procedure with better future prospects in mind.
The breakthrough of this pig kidney transplant follows earlier successes in transplanting genetically modified pig organs into humans, including brain-dead individuals and recipients of pig hearts. This operation represents significant progress in the medical field and offers new possibilities for saving lives through innovative transplant procedures.
