BRIN Head: Pig Organ Transplantation To Humans Needs To Be Studied From An Ethical Perspective

Illustration (Pixabay)

JAKARTA - Head of the National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN) Laksana Tri Handoko stated the need for an ethical study of transplanting pig organs into the human body.

"As a research, this is certainly interesting. But from an ethical point of view and local wisdom, it needs to be studied," said Handoko when contacted by Antara in Jakarta, Thursday, January 13.

Handoko said that transplanting animal organs to humans or xenotransplantation is an interesting thing to explore from a research perspective.

However, according to him, there are many factors including ethics and culture that need to be considered in the implementation of xenotransplantation, a procedure that among other things involves transplanting, implanting, or inserting living cells, tissues, or animal organs into humans.

According to information published on the official website of the United States Food and Drug Administration, the development of xenotransplantation is partly driven by the fact that demand for human organs for clinical transplantation far exceeds supply.

Although the potential benefits are quite large, xenotransplantation is feared to cause infection in recipients that can be transmitted to their close contacts and other residents.

Acting Head of the BRIN Life Sciences Research Organization, Iman Hidayat, when contacted separately, said that the door to studying animal organ transplantation to humans remains open for Indonesian researchers.

However, he continued, in this case the ethical and legal factors of religion must be considered considering that the majority of Indonesia's population is Muslim.

Moreover, according to Iman, there are other options such as the installation of artificial organs and cell transplants to improve organ function.

This week there is news about the successful transplantation of pig hearts into humans.

A team led by surgeon Bartley P Griffith, MD, performs a genetically modified pig heart transplant to David Bennett, a 57-year-old patient with severe heart disease, at the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore, Maryland, United States, Friday (7/1) , and the transplant operation was considered a success.