Baboons survived 6 months with pig's hearts

[Eldorado]

In four adjacent enclosures transplantation researcher Bruno Reichart kept four happy baboons. “They can hop around, eat, drink and they are enjoying life,” he says. “They watch TV—their favorite is the cartoon with the chipmunk.” Most importantly, he says, they were healthy and normal—which is astonishing, given the fact that the hearts beating life in their chests were anything but normal for a baboon.

All four of the baboons that lived in Reichart’s lab at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich had their original hearts surgically replaced with ones from genetically engineered pigs. Two of the baboons were euthanized after they lived 90 days—the survival period for any nonhuman primate set by the International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation as a benchmark to indicate xenotransplantation might be safe enough to try in humans.

The other two kept going for twice as long before Reichart’s team euthanized them, too. That survival period, says Muhammad Mohiuddin, a surgeon and director of the Cardiac Xenotransplantation Program at the University of Maryland who was not involved with this work, “is an extraordinary achievement. You cannot stress this more. The next step from here is clinical transplantation [in people].”

Full article: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/baboons-survive-for-half-a-year-after-heart-transplants-from-pigs/

[SHaYap]

Hey Elmer ...

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Poor animals. How long should they suffer for us ? :(

[Trenix]

This is not the future, just unnecessary suffering for animals. Better off engineering devices that will replace organs.

[spartan max2]

In medical science you have to use animals to test stuff, the only alternative is to use untested things on humans.

A neccesary evil

[Trenix]

15 hours ago, spartan max2 said:

In medical science you have to use animals to test stuff, the only alternative is to use untested things on humans.

A neccesary evil

Completely false. Animals and humans react differently, even as stated by this article. Use simulations and stem cells, not animals and people.

[spartan max2]

14 minutes ago, Trenix said:

Completely false. Animals and humans react differently, even as stated by this article. Use simulations and stem cells, not animals and people.

That is funny, I'm sure the scientist just use animal test subjects to torture them, they can't possible be learning any useful information from it lol.

Baboons are one of the most similar animals to us, so they may not be exactly the same but it still helps in the process. Science use animal subjects before human subjects for safety reasons. You have to see if it is safe and successful on a animal before you are allowed to experiment it on a human, typically. Our technique and technology with simulations and stem cells are just not advanced enough yet to replace animal experiments.

The vast majority of researchers would gladly not use animals in their experiments if their were viable alternatives. 

Edited December 10, 2018 by spartan max2

[Jon the frog]

So they survived six months... poor baboons. Why they cannot do these experiments on child rapist instead?

[Trenix]

On 12/10/2018 at 3:21 PM, spartan max2 said:

That is funny, I'm sure the scientist just use animal test subjects to torture them, they can't possible be learning any useful information from it lol.

Baboons are one of the most similar animals to us, so they may not be exactly the same but it still helps in the process. Science use animal subjects before human subjects for safety reasons. You have to see if it is safe and successful on a animal before you are allowed to experiment it on a human, typically. Our technique and technology with simulations and stem cells are just not advanced enough yet to replace animal experiments.

The vast majority of researchers would gladly not use animals in their experiments if their were viable alternatives. 

I never said there was no benefit or that no information obtained was useful. What I'm saying that you don't NEED animals to be your test subjects, at least not anymore. Technology is moving forward and we should look into better and cheaper alternatives, not continue outdated, expensive, and immoral practices. Look up In Vitro testing, computer modeling, and micro-dosing as examples. Trump also signed the "right-to-try" legislation so patients can try experimental drugs if they want. Move forward, not backwards.

[Suprnova]

Why do these tests on animals that are not really close to us genetically? yes they are in the order of primates but they are about as similar to us as Hippos are to Killer Whales (maybe a exaggeration and we are a bit closer because of the volume of different primates, and we are essentially on a closer branch but its still pretty far).

 

I mean if they were unethically to do this to a animal for human benefits surely one of the great apes ie: Chimapnzees would have been a better option, but even then its wrong.