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Science

Pig-to-Human Transplants On Their Way 332

cscx writes: "From the folks who brought you Dolly the cloned sheep, come genetically modified cloned pigs which they claim may eventually be able to donate their organs to humans for transplant usage. Who knows, we may make that mark on your driver's license obsolete after all."
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Pig-to-Human Transplants On Their Way

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  • by Afrosheen ( 42464 ) on Monday August 26, 2002 @07:39PM (#4144822)
    Is this gonna be kosher or not?
    • I would think this would come down to your values. Would you sacrifice your life because of your religious beliefs or would you compromise your beliefs to save your life. (I'm not Jewish, but I fall under the later.)
      • Looks to me like people in the middle east, Jewish or Muslim, don't really have a problem with sacrificing their lives for their religious beliefs. I doubt anyone who had a religious and deeply ingrained aversion to pork could live with themselves having a pork heart beating away inside their chest. I was hoping some Jewish people could provide some insight.
        • not true at all. there are definitely rules that override kashrut. this is one of them. if it saves a life, it's all good. not sure about muslim belief, though. u really can't associate the 2: they are quite radically different.

          • Anyone remember John Goodman's character in The Big Lebowski?

            "Saturday, Donny, is shabbas, the Jewish day of rest. That means I don't work, I don't drive a car, I don't fucking ride in a car, I don't handle money, I don't turn on the oven, and I sure as shit don't fucking roll!"

            So this could be up in the air for all we know.
    • by Moosifer ( 168884 ) on Monday August 26, 2002 @07:55PM (#4144941)
      Yes - it would be acceptable. There's a law in judaism that translates roughly to "for the sake of the life" that essentially overrides most other restrictive laws, including those of the sabbath and kosher practices. Contrary to what the "fanatical middle-east religion" poster suggested, life is actually considered valuable.
  • Okay, so fifty years ago a patient would have died from a failing organ, now that patient lives. Is this a case where the strongest no longer survive? Are we on our way to overpopulation? Eh, that's off topic. But, after we all praise this as a life saver, what are the consequences?
    • by tempny ( 602740 ) on Monday August 26, 2002 @07:44PM (#4144872)
      My grandma is at that stage of her life where she should have normally been dead. Not to sound coarse, as I love her, but she is being kept alive by drugs which reduce her life to confusion and pain, and I suspect against her will. A lot of medical science these days seems to have forgotten that quality of life matters as much as life itself.
    • Take into consideration all the medicines that have been created and successful over the last century or two. We're already on our way to overpopulation as the senior population grows by leaps and bounds. There are probably (I'm guessing) 10% more people surviving potentially life-threatening illnesses than there were 100 years ago. No more tuberculosis, polio, pneumonia doesn't kill (as often) and neither does influenza. The only two things that can potentially hit the reset switch on overpopulation is a massive world war or another plague with the same scope and devastation as the Black Plague which swept Europe.

      I doubt this will change much. You can rest assured that this process will be available almost exclusively to the rich and powerful. I doubt it'll ever become affordable and convenient enough to affect the population at large.
    • The CIA info (Score:3, Informative)

      by coryboehne ( 244614 )
      Here is what the CIA has to say on the subject.
      Demo Trends CIA report [cia.gov]
      • To me, the most surprising part of the CIA report was this: In Florida, reknown for its elderly population, 18.5% of the population is over the age of 65. Italy as a whole will reach this same 18.5% in 2003, joined by Japan in 2005, and Germany in 2006. France follows in 2016, and the US as a whole reaches 18.5% in 2023. I assume a big reason for the US staying younger for longer will be immigration. I wonder when "white" people will no longer be more than 50% of the US.
    • I think it is most definitely getting to the point where we need to consider the effect of unnatural life extension on overpopulation. At this point we are expending tremendous effort to extend life, but very little on preventing new births. Um, folks, if we keep breeding, and quit dying, it doesn't take much to see that that's an unsustainable situation. Unless we magically figure out how to extend the available food supply, we're looking at rough times starting in about 20-30 years. I dunno, maybe we should just start up the ol' soylent green plant. But a more likely solution would be to expand worldwide family planning services.
    • Is this a case where the strongest no longer survive?

      Was that ever the case? Are you stronger than a baboon?

      Are we on our way to overpopulation?

      Yes. See Tragedy of the Commons [dieoff.org]. "A finite world can support only a finite population; therefore, population growth must eventually equal zero."

    • Think about it.
    • Our species gave up the benefits of evolution by natural selection (at least as Darwin saw it) when we decided to come out of the trees and build civilizations. Think about it: instead of letting the weak die, we raly to help them and the strong no longer have a reproductive advantage. Is this right or wrong? Who cares, but it isn't helping our gene pool.

      Instead of natural selection at an individual level, we have natural selection at a civilization level. The earth has multiple civilizations, whether they are delinated by geography or culture can be debated, and they rise and fall, just as species come and go.

      The interesting part is that what makes a good civilization is rarely something physical, like it usually is for species, but something mental (if that's the right word).

    • Realistically speaking, the environmental impact of a medical technology that will be unaffordable by the great mass of people on the planet for the forseeable future is negligible.

      Yes, one aspect of any effective medical treatment is that certain genetic diseases/weaknesses are not weeded out of the population as rapidly. But so what? Pretty soon, we'll probably be curing genetic disease directly.
  • organs (Score:2, Insightful)

    by prichardson ( 603676 )
    Many people may find it squeemish to have an organ of a pig in their bodies, but it is a good alternative to death.
    • Re:organs (Score:5, Funny)

      by rbgaynor ( 537968 ) on Monday August 26, 2002 @07:45PM (#4144883)

      Unless, of course, you are the pig...

      • ok

        why cant they just say transgenic pigs ?
        (or arn't the slashdot crowd able to understand technical terms)

        if you really wanted to go after this and you had money (like a drug company) then you would use Bonobo's [bonobo.org] because they are much closer to humans and the the organs are the right size (the primary reason to use pigs is that the organs are the right size )

        whatever your postion on this dont think its not going to happen it is
        (drug companys have to much to gain)
        lets keep it in the open and monitor it rather than banning it and leting the drug companies move to a nation which will turn a blind eye and selling it on there (to have the op you fly to chad and pay your money then fly back to the country which banned it)

        basically the Biological people screwed themselves by allowing patents on genetic sequences and had to get a non profit group do the human genome so that could not be patented lets not allow that to happen in software

        regards

        John Jones

    • I don't know about you, but I find that a slow excruciating death makes me a tad more squeemish than a pig's organs :)
    • That might depend on ones belief as to what comes after death.
  • by coryboehne ( 244614 ) on Monday August 26, 2002 @07:41PM (#4144843)
    MMMM, Bacon.... drool :p~~~~

    Now after I block my veins with fatty deposits, and destroy my heart, the same pig can now give me a new heart? Awesome....
    • Make the pig pay for your mistakes, that's real friggin compassionate, man.

      =)
    • by Frank of Earth ( 126705 ) <frank AT fperkins DOT com> on Monday August 26, 2002 @08:55PM (#4145238) Homepage Journal
      Ok.. I have to quote the Simpson's episode:

      Homer: Are you saying you're never going to eat any animal again? What about bacon?
      Lisa: No.
      Homer: Ham?
      Lisa: No!
      Homer: Pork chops?
      Lisa: Dad, those all come from the same animal!
      Homer: Heh heh heh... ooh... yeah... right, Lisa. A wonderful... magical animal.

      Courtesy of http://www.kerp.net/homer.html
    • Don't forget the argument between Vincent and Jules in Pulp Fiction:

      -"Want some bacon?"
      -"Nah, man, I don't eat pork."
      -"Are you Jewish?"
      -"Nah, I ain't Jewish. I just don't dig on swine, that's all."
      -"Why not?"
      -"Pigs are filthy animals. I don't eat filthy animals."
      -"Yeah, but bacon tastes good. Pork chops taste good."
      -"Hey. Sewer rat may taste like pumpkin pie, but I'd never know cuz I wouldn't eat the filthy motherfuckers. Pigs sleep and root in shit. That's a filthy animal. I ain't eatin' nothin' that ain't got sense enough to disreguard it's own feces."
      -"What about a dog? A dog eat's it's own feces."
      -"I don't eat dog either."
      -"Yeah, but do you consider a dog to be a filthy animal?"
      -"I wouldn't go so far as to call a dog filthy, but they're definately dirty. But, a dog's got personality, personality goes a long way."
      -"Ah, so by that rationale, if a pig had a better personality, he'd cease to be a filthy animal. Is that true?"
      -"Well, we'd have to be talkin' about one charming motherfucking pig. I mean, he'd have to be ten times more charming than that Arnold on Green Acres."
    • A free honey-glazed ham with every heart transplant!
  • Wasn't this covered already? [slashdot.org]

    Call me when they have human-to-animal transplants...

    • human-to-animal

      nice 1

      I've got a disease that might end with organ trouble.

      I'm sat here now saying that if it's me or the pig I'll let the pig live.

      "We can take your body after you're dead,
      We can take the eyes out your fucking head.
      Yeah, we'll take 'em out use 'em again,
      We can do it you know, cos we've got your brain

      We'll crucify you like we crucified him,
      Make you obey our every whim,
      Cos we've got the power,
      The power and the glory
      "

      Crass

  • Pork butts (Score:3, Funny)

    by GuyMannDude ( 574364 ) on Monday August 26, 2002 @07:44PM (#4144877) Journal

    I think this technology already exists. I saw this one dude walking down the sidewalk yesterday and I swear his ass looked like it originally belonged to a pig! All it was missing was that little curly-cue tail. Man, you should have seen that ass! Oink!

    GMD

  • This is more like... Being harvested.
  • by wirelessbuzzers ( 552513 ) on Monday August 26, 2002 @07:45PM (#4144882)
    They only knocked out the genes for the production of one sugar from the pigs. Organ rejection is fairly common in human-to-human transplants; do we have any reason to believe that this will be any different? Perhaps they won't be rejected *as fast* or *as acutely* as before, so the patient will be dead in two months instead of a week, but really how much better is that?

    And did you also notice that this info has yet to be peer-reviewed?

    I'm not a troll, I'm a skeptic...
    • Animal to human transplants have worked in the past (Baboon hearts anyone?), but the success rate is far from perfect and the long-term results questionable.

      More of a concern is the possibility of diseases jumping cross-species. Consider, say, scrapie in sheep becoming BSE in cows and CJD in humans. Similar problems will almost certainly arise with cross species transplants, especially with relatively benign diseases in one species becoming dangerous in humans.
    • They could be used as carry-over transplants. That is, at least that person can stay alive until they can wait for a real transplant; as transplant lists are incredibly long (months). This is also what prompted mechanical temporary replacements (such as Left-Ventricular Assist Devices).

      Furthermore, they probably started off with a pig that was already null for other histocompatibility genes. This research has been going on for a bit as has been mentioned. Genetics plays a role in determining which genes to knock out (and how much that product contributes to the immunologic response). If the presence of this sugar really amplifies the response, then knocking it out among other things may allow it to last for a while. Inflammation is a progressive process and not something that the body just turns on and off.
    • when you're the person that recieves that transplant, living two more months instead of one more week I think would be VERY important to you.
    • Actually, the galactose is a big barrier to xenotransplantation. Back when this was my main topic of study, I came across articles where people were trying downright desparate techniques to quell the antibody response.

      Here's a quick summary that touches on some of the major issues:
      http://www.facsnet.org/tools/sci_tech/biotek/pig.p hp3 [facsnet.org]

      I've seen both gross and histological examinations of porcine livers that have been destroyed by hyperacute rejection. Not pretty.

      Here's another article that discusses some of the responses in more detail:

      http://www.racp.edu.au/tsanz/xeno3.htm [racp.edu.au]

      So basically, this is a pretty large step towards xenotransplantation.
      • I've seen both gross and histological examinations of porcine livers that have been destroyed by hyperacute rejection.

        Are you saying the histological examinations aren't "gross"? Ba da bing! Thanks, I'll be here all week.

  • Obligatory Orwell (Score:3, Insightful)

    by PD ( 9577 ) <slashdotlinux@pdrap.org> on Monday August 26, 2002 @07:47PM (#4144891) Homepage Journal
    This is just too much like "Animal Farm", it's spooky. Oh well, at least we'll be running the place.
  • As a type 1 diabetic (Score:3, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 26, 2002 @07:50PM (#4144909)
    I watch all of this carefully. For many years, they made insulin for humans from pigs (and then later cows). About 20 years ago, they started producing real human insulin. The pig/cow insulins were fairly close to human, and worked well enough to keep people alive.

    In recent years, they've been able to transplant islet cells from human pancreases into type 1 diabetics, essentially making them non-diabetic. However, each procedure requires two prancreases, so that drives the cost and effort up. If they could use pig pancreases instead, it'd probably be quite easy and even affordable (once you consider the cost of insulin and all the other supplies) to perform this procedure more.

    Of course, the major obstacle they still face is rejection. Beyond the normal sort of organ rejection problem is the fact that type 1 diabetics' bodies were the ones that killed off the insulin producing cells in the first place. A lot of the anti-rejection drugs have their own nasty side-effects, and I'm not sure a life of those is any better than a life of injecting insulin.
  • by CowbertPrime ( 206514 ) <.ten.y2.trebwoc. .ta. .oomris.> on Monday August 26, 2002 @07:54PM (#4144932) Homepage
    When we look at tissue grafting and associated histocompatibility issues, we usually think of proteins. That is, after all, how the histocompatibility genes were discovered first in mice then humans, and the modern field of immunogenetics was founded. However, the article points to sugars and how their absence can so lessen acute xenograft rejection. The role of sugars in cell recognition can be found in the January 1993 issue of Scientific American.
    • I'm pretty skeptical of this one myself. One sugar isn't all that's going to trigger an immune reaction to cause graft rejection. The MHC molecules are perhaps the biggest known issue, given that the pig has very different MHC molecules than a human. Hell, even different humans have different MHC molecules, which is why kidney donors should be related to the receiver.

      While sugars do play a role in cell recognition, it's not nearly so important in graft rejection because graft rejection is mediated by the immune system, which focuses more on protein-protein interactions. Knocking out a sugar might help with graft rejection (this seems dubious to me) but seriously... don't you think that a pig should be producing plenty of other molecules with slightly different epitopes to be recognized by human antibodies?

      At the most, I'd imagine that this would delay acute graft rejection in a very well done transplant. But I still think immunosuppression, very likely over the remainder of the patient's life, would be necessary.
  • Proof (Score:2, Insightful)

    by J4 ( 449 )
    We need more philosophy and less technology.
  • about Pigs and Cops, but I'm not sure what it is.

    This is the perfect forum to try out your pork chops.

    Gotta wake up! Gotta wake up!

  • Riffing off of Douglas Adams:

    If we make these xenotransplant pigs intelligent, they'll be able to give informed consent.

    This way, if any right groups challenge the ethics of the transplant, the hospital adminstrators can whip out a donor consent card with the pig' little hoof print.

    Or course, we'd have to make them really gullible, so they actually volunteer when asked, instead of rolling their eyes and saying "yeah, right!"

    • There was this experimenter in Russia, can't remember his name, it might have been Pavlov. He was doing some experiments with pigs where he strapped them down to a rack and conditioned them awhile before he killed them (looking for some physical results from conditioning, I think). The pigs all got hysterical, so he stopped using them and switched to dogs. The dogs just played their part nicely, and got their hearts cut out. He decided that pigs were just too hysterical. Perhaps they *are* sapient?
  • Could you imagine Apple's advertisers doing THIS campain?

    And my heart was going like beep beep beep beep beep. And then my bloop pressure dropped in half and I was like, bhmuuuggghhh? And then half my good heart was, like, gone. It's a shame too, cause it was a really nice heart. Bummer. Oh, and my name is Eric Cartman, and I'm a student. www.apple.com/Have_A_Heart/Switch/

  • Forget the pigs, what I'm waiting for that mammoth [slashdot.org] to be cloned. I may need a backpack to carry around my heart, but by God they made 'em good back in the old days.
  • by Wolfier ( 94144 )
    I can get a brain transplant from one of these pigs to use it as my math co-processor!

    Then...I'll have 3 brains!
  • by McSpew ( 316871 ) on Monday August 26, 2002 @08:29PM (#4145109)

    Anybody who watches Frontline [pbs.org] on PBS [pbs.org] has already seen a lengthy and incredibly in-depth story about the future of xenotransplantation [pbs.org].

    The scary part about pig-to-human transplants is the possibility of humans contracting pig viruses through xenotransplants that could mutate and cause widespread disease. Transplant patients have to take medications that suppress their immune systems so their bodies won't reject their new organs. Thus, the possibility of cross-species disease propagation is very real and very scary.

    Pigs being bred for transplantation are currently birthed by caesarian section directly into a bath of iodine and kept in a sterile environment from then on. But even so, it's unlikely that such animals are 100% free of pathogens. Anyone who receives a pig organ should understand that they will be considered as much of a disease threat as if they were HIV-positive for the rest of their lives. They are not to have unprotected sex and should not have children.

    It's scary stuff and not to be taken lightly.

    • by dvdeug ( 5033 ) <dvdeug&email,ro> on Monday August 26, 2002 @08:46PM (#4145195)
      the possibility of cross-species disease propagation is very real and very scary.

      Why? We've been living with and eating these creatures for millenia. (We've probably been having sex with them for the same time, sick as the concept may be.) Many farmers have probably got pigs blood in open wounds - they tend not to be squeamish when killing animals. If there's a disease that pigs carry that humans haven't already developed at least partial immunity to, then it is extraordinarily hard to catch.

      They are not to have unprotected sex and should not have children.

      Um, why? Why do we think that those will be the primary means of transmission? If a new disease does come out of the woodwork, it seems that any mode of transmission may be used.
    • How is this any different than what is currently happening?

      How is this any different than a current human disease mutating to become more virulent? Or perhaps simply virulent? HIV didn't spring from SIV because of some transplant, it happened in the wild. The Hong Kong strain of influenza that caused such a scare didn't happen because of human meddling, it happened in the wild.

      These things happen in nature, and are rare there, even when all these pathogens have the opportunity to do things like coinfect cells, swap genes, and mutate like crazy. What makes you think that it's so likely as to happen simply due to a transplant?

      The problem, as you mention, is immunosuppression, which prevents the body from fighting off any infection that could get in to their transplant. The point of research like this (if it even works, that remains to be seen) is that you don't have to fully immunosuppress, if at all. I'm confident that one day short term immunosuppression will be enough for most transplants, and these people will be able to live normal, healthy lives. Then the chance of this happening drops even further, to the point where all the scaremongering over mutation becomes pointless. Mutations happen, you can't stop them, but that doesn't mean they're really more likely or more dangerous due to science.
    • pigs and other animals are already the sources for many of our horrible diseases. We already got most of them from living so close to them.
    • PERV (Score:5, Informative)

      by tlambert ( 566799 ) on Monday August 26, 2002 @11:13PM (#4145871)
      You are talking about Porcine Endogenous Retro Virus (PERV).

      The answer is that we have actually been using pigs for Xenotransplantation for a very long time: my Grandfather had a pig-valve in his heart, and Jim Finn has fetal pig brain cells in his brain, along with 12 other people, which has (effectively) halted his parkinsons disease, and reversed most of the symptoms (he can work on his car himself now, when before he was reduced from crawling from room to room on his elbows).

      Both of these surgeries are vintage 1980's/1990's, and many heart-vavle operations predate that time period, since we did not have mechanical replacements designed until more recently.

      The Russians have also been using pig liver cells to treat incurable, and otherwise fatal hepatitus and liver cancer cases, successfully.

      In all cases, the protocols require that the person remain sexually inactive in order to avoid the risk of transmitting PERV human-to-human.

      However, all testing for the past two decades has indicated that PERV is not transmissable to humans from transplanted tissue: out of the many hundreds of porcine xenotransplant recipients, not a single one tests positive for PERV anywhere but the transplanted porcine cells themselves.

      If you are up for a lot of reading, Jim Finn's story (in short form) with a lot of links is available at:

      http://tv.carlton.com/organfarm/jim.jhtml

      See also Jim's own online journal:

      http://www.geocities.com/jimcfinn/index.html

      Here is the medical writeup of Jim and the 12 other patients in the journal "Neurology":

      http://www.neurology.org/cgi/content/abstract/54 /5 /1042

      -- Terry
    • Thus, the possibility of cross-species disease propagation is very real and very scary.

      Yeah just like cow pox. Oh wait... cow pox was the first ever vaccination (vacca is the latin word for cow) and because of it smallpox only exists in 2 places in the world (frozen in Atlanta and in Moscow). We've been around animals like pigs and cows for so long that the risk of getting a new disease from them is very slim. The risk of a patient rejecting the organ is a major concern however. But I guess if you need a new heart you may be willing to take that chance.

  • Pigs (Score:2, Funny)

    by infornogr ( 603568 )
    I can understand the medical benefits of taking organs from pigs and putting them into people... but if we keep doing this... won't we eventually run out of politicians and CEOs?
    • I can understand the medical benefits of taking organs from pigs and putting them into people... but if we keep doing this... won't we eventually run out of politicians and CEOs?

      You say that as if it would be a Bad Thing...

  • .. a real life Police Chief Wiggum!
  • by Sivar ( 316343 )
    "Who knows, we may make that mark on your driver's license obsolete after all."

    I thought it was pigs that would be doing the... Oh.
  • by Sj0 ( 472011 )
    Ahem.

    BRING ON THE LUDDITES!

    Thank you. That is all.
  • ... my girlfriend will be somewhat correct when she calls me a pig.
  • From the folks who brought you Dolly the cloned sheep
    Dolly is often referenced as a scientific success but don't forget that the success was only partial. She is aging abnormally. The process was imperfect, but pro-cloners seem keen to overlook this...?
    genetically modified cloned pigs which they claim may eventually be able to
    donate their organs to humans for transplant usage.
    The pigs won't be donating anything. They'll be born, we'll kill them with, I'd guess, little consultation or due process, and then we'll take their organs. It's not going to be a voluntary act of piggy good nature.
  • Just what we need is another vector for animal diseases to pass over into humans.
  • This is an awful idea. Other posters have pointed out how this makes it far easier for viral and bacterial diseases to leap across the species barrier, but there's a good story about it that they may not know.

    In The Coming Plague [amazon.com], Laurie Garrett recounts how the primate supply facility that supplied the baboon whose heart was transplanted into Baby Fae was horrified when they learned what was done with it. They had not known that the ape was to be used as a transplant donor, and would have refused had they know. Seems the ape in question was infected with cytomegalovirus, simian AIDS, and a variety of other diseases that generally don't infect humans, but might if you take the organ out of the ape and stick it in a person.

    Later, she tells of a virus carried by a certain species of monkey. It's harmless to that monkey, but readily infects another species which shares habitat with the first. Upon infection, it causes a variety of leukemias and lymphomas so widespread and virulent that death frequently occurs in mere weeks.

    And it's airborne.

    Man, I'm not sure if any pigs carry anything even near so nasty, but I can't think of a worse thing to be doing. Research money spent for this purpose would be far, far better spent on learning how to grow fresh, healthy, transplantable human organs.
  • To have a nose transplant

  • Where I work, this would not be considered by any of us a trans-species transplant if it were for our boss.
  • Another topic to file under "Just because you can, doesn't mean you should." First, I wouldn't use a religious argument against it's use, because it mainly applies to their consumption and the infested environments pigs live in regularly. I figure pigs marked for "harvesting" would have grow up in a relatively sterile environment. The cross species disease thing is a worry, however. Whee, you can transplant ape hearts. I guess. And pig valves. Yay. But the entire process reminds me of lazer eye surgery to some extent and it shakey beginnings. Sure, you were promised 20/20, but more often than not one wasn't told of the very risky side effects that could result. Never heard much about those, at least not as much as you probably should have. Piggly trnasplant endorcements remind me of this very issue...

    "We can rebuild him. Stronger. Faster. And he'll taste like a BLT, too!"
    • everyone living in nice, wolf-proof, brick houses
    • finding more and more restaurants with slop on the menu
    • women getting somewhat smaller, but remarkably more numerous, breasts
    • WWE going all-mud
    • NOT being ridiculed for looking/acting like a such a g*dd*mned pig
  • Reminds me of a story I just read on my palm, an older story by H.G. Wells. You can download it free at memoware [memoware.com] for free.

    M@

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