Pros And Cons Of Xenotransplantation

Throughout time Organ transplanting has been an important medical procedure that has been present, not only in the United States, but around the globe. It is the process of surgically removing an organ from on patient and then transplanting it into the other. This practice is usually used when a recipient’s own organ fails to function properly or has

     The first attempts of xenotrantransplantation in the U.S. did not occur until the 1960’s. During this time, scientists tried to transplant baboon and chimpanzee organs to humans. These transplants failed due to rejection by the human immune system (Baker, 643). The most well known xenotransplantation attempt, known as Baby Fae, occurred in 1985 at the Coma Linda University Medical Center in California. During this surgery, Dr. Leonard Bailey completed the first human neonatal cardiac xenotransplantation by placing the heart of a baboon into an infant. Fae, the infant, suffered from hypo-plastic left heart syndrome, or simply an incomplete heart. The heart functioned for twenty days until stopping, killing Baby Fae (Clark, 1085). This attempt raised difficult ethical and policy issues, which have not yet been answered.

Xenotransplantation is a controversial medical procedure that has been debated by medical ethicists for many years. Xenotransplantation or Xeno is defined as the short-term transplantation of animal tissues into a human. It has been argued that the procedure is unethical because of the use of animal organs. However, twenty two people die each day waiting for an organ transplant, so we must act soon to save the thousands of lives that are still waiting. Xenotransplantation is a highly debatable procedure and offers a unique solution to the ever growing organ transplant list, making it a viable and worthwhile procedure.

The medical industry had been achieving more in the stage of medical advancements, though they are still in the early phase. Artificial organs have been one of those achievements. Although they have achieved such, artificial organs are not perfect. Most doctors as well as patients would prefer to replace a dying organ with a compatible human organ, rather than with an artificial or animal organ. Yet due to a there being less organs donated than recipients, artificial and animal organs are becoming more common in transplants. Most of this issue is because people are unaware of how organ donation works, the organs that can be donated, how many people are in need, and the advancements that have happened in the field. Organ donation saves hundreds of lives every year, but many lives are recklessly lost due to a shortage of organ donors.

Although people are dying on the waiting list for transplants (6) as xenotransplantation requires the farming and slaughtering of animals so that they can provide the organs, cells and tissue required many people believe that it is not worth the suffering of those animals. (7) The extent of the priority we give to human beings interest over animals is an important issue. Some Hindu and Buddhist groups oppose xenotransplantation for this very reason as they do not agree with harming animals for the benefit of others. (7) Even people who do not identify with a religion find that they oppose xenotransplantation as they have a strong affiliation with animal rights.

An average of 16 people die in Europe each day without getting the organ they need to survive. 22 people die each day in the United States without getting the organ they need, too. All of these people who die are waiting for organs such like a liver, heart, and other organs that will help keep them alive. The scientists looked at the statistics and wanted to start to develop new organs and body parts to save the patients that are waiting for them. The scientists thought they could start by growing them in a laboratory and make them out of stem cells. They have been struggling with the development of the organs and the progress has been slowed. Other scientists have another theory in how to create a fully functioning organ. They think that everyone should let nature take over and let evolutions happen. Evolutions has helped cells adapt to outside environments and turned our cells into complex molecules that help us survive. The scientists also think that they could use an animal's’ kidney, liver, lungs, heart, and other organs that are useful to keep ourselves alive. Those organs can come from animals, like pigs, because they have somewhat the same kind of organs we have. The only problem that can occur during the operation is that, when you use transfer the heart from a pig, or another animal, our immune system will reject the transplant. People who have been studying about growing human

Xenotransplantation is something we don’t hear everyday. Xenotransplantation is a process where animal organs, tissues and cells are transplanted into humans for medical reasons. The most common animal to transplant organs into humans, with the most success, is a pig. It is a personal opinion whether or not xenotransplantation can help or hurt you. Before deciding whether to do the operation or not you will have to look at the pros and cons that are listed

These medical techniques cannot only be used to benefit humans, but animals may be able to be saved as well. Full animal cloning could be used to increase the

Although currently it is only at a preclinical stage, xenotransplantation is needed to provide an unlimited supply of tissues and organs for transplantation. In the United States, “13 patients die each day waiting to receive a life-saving transplant to replace a diseased organ” The lack of donor tissues such as pancreatic islets is also increasing, statistics show that approximately 140 million people in the world have diabetes but only several thousand pancreatic glands become available annually. This shortage could be aided by xenotransplantation, for example using pancreatic islets from pigs. Xenotransplantation has the potential to completely eliminate the need for human organ donors as organs could be mass produced in animals such as pigs and harvested on demand, which would allow the stockpiling of viable organs for donation. The organs could also be genetically altered to be, for example, more strong or

The main concerns of the Commentary perspective were that although there are a lot of new strategies for cross-breeding; a pressing example would be a live organ donation which links the exchanges between extended families with recipient family members, live donation is only possible for paired organs like a kidney transplant. Beginning the search for other sources of replacement organs has expanded. The main concerns of the Attitudes toward Death perspective was the recognition that all living beings understand that both birth and death and may perhaps serve to relativize the request and/ or need for more organ replacements and that may help us to see what is at stake: on the one hand, there is a possibility of an additional lifespan for a given individual who has a lower quality of life and on the other hand, some intervention in the environment is necessary for all other living beings as well. The main concerns of the Animal Organs perspective were that the companies involved in the development of xenotransplants insisted that they are raising and willing to raise the animals in environments that were sterile as possible. Individual animals are then inspected and went through periods of quarantine before admission to the factory herd. The main concerns of the Risk Assessment perspective were that there may be a slight risk to present and future generations, or there might be tremendous risk to present and future generations, but it is rather hard to determine. The main concerns of the Religious Perspectives paragraph highlighted how successful xenotransplants would be about ensuring the quality of life that they give to recipients, how much human DNA is transferred to the animals and vice versa, and to what degree of suffering the process is understood to entail for all the animals

On the other side, the idea of allowing open organ market has strongly opposed by some transplant surgeons and other doctors. They claimed that selling or paying for organs is ineffective. Also, they argued that this is an immoral way solve the problem because it involves the sale of body parts and that the main donators will be poor people who needed money desperately and regret their decision. Basically, critics are saying that sale of organs is repugnant.

The medical advances of donor organs and organ transplants have made incredible leaps and bounds in recent decades. Today we can grow stem cells from normal skin tissues, but there are still ethical arguments against the practice of using stem cells for medical procedures. Being able to produce these stem cells from our body tissues is a huge bound forward in medical advances. With that, it is possible to create an organ for the individual who needs it; increasing the organ's viability and ability to be used; ensuring there is no damage or contaminates from donor organs. Now of course even lab-grown organs have its list of ethical backlash that it has faced in recent years. Medical professionals and scientists are already growing organs

Everyday a new name is added to the list of 120,000 Americans in need of organ transplants. Science is evolving and is problem solving the organ shortage crisis, that kills an average estimate of 20 Americans daily. All these lives can be saved with the new medical innovation. Xenotransplantation is a fascinating medical breakthrough and a possible solution to resolve the organ shortage in America.

For years, scientist have been trying to successfully conduct xenotransplantation, however it did not show promising results. Animals such as primate and pigs are the common animals used in xenotransplantation. Xenotransplantation is where the organism of a transgenic animal with human organism is transplanted into a human body. On October 26, 1984, xenotransplantation took

Physicians today are faced with a growing list of patients awaiting transplants for organs that have failed, but there are not enough donors to meet these needs. Countries all over the world have a “human organ shortage” and the waiting lists for organ transplants only seem to grow longer (Melo 427). In the United States 62,000 patients needed a kidney, liver, or pancreatic transplant in the year 2001. Xenotransplantation, which refers to the transplantation of organs, cells, or tissues from animal species into human beings, has been heralded as a promising technology that will help us save more lives and lessen the dire shortage of transplantable organs.