David Bennett, 57, died on Tuesday. His condition had “started to deteriorate several days ago”, but his body had not rejected the transplant.
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The first patient in the world to have received a heart transplant from a genetically modified pig has died, two months after his operation. The University of Maryland Hospital, where he was being cared for, announced it on Wednesday March 9. The state of health of David Bennett, 57, “began to deteriorate several days agosaid the establishment. When it became clear that he would not recover, he was given palliative care.”
The operation, carried out on January 7, had raised great hopes, because such transplants could potentially make it possible to remedy the shortage of organ donations. “The heart functioned very well for several weeks, without any signs of rejection”, the hospital said. After the operation, “the patient was able to spend time with his family and participate in physiotherapy activities to help him regain his strength”. The researchers therefore consider the experiment a success.
The optimistic researchers
“We have obtained valuable information and learned that a genetically modified pig’s heart can function properly inside a human body”said Muhammad Mohiuddin, scientific director of the hospital’s xenotransplantation program. “We remain optimistic and plan to continue our work in future clinical trials.”
Without this transplant, David Bennett was doomed. “It was either death or this transplant. I want to live”he said the day before the operation. “Until the end, my father wanted to keep fighting to preserve his life and spend more time with his family”his son, David Bennett Jr., said in a statement. “We were able to spend precious weeks together while he was recovering from his surgery, weeks that we would not have had without this miraculous effort.”